MEDICINE: The twoyear UCSF experiment will try to determine what effects,if any,marijuana has on HIVinfected subjects. SAN FRANCISCOThe federal government has given the goahead to a comprehensive study of the safety and effectiveness of pot smoking by HIVinfected patients. The research project, run by Dr. Donald Abrams and his team of scientists at the University of California, San Francisco, will pay volunteers $1,000 to be hospitalized for 25 days and either smoke pot, take a tablet form of the drug or take a placebo. [continues 306 words]
HEALTH: A Senate panel is told that 'tens of millions' of Americans are combining ancient wisdom and modern science. WASHINGTON - Doctors and scientists argued for better government support for alternative medicine Thursday, saying it needed to be treated seriously. People are using alternative and complementary medicine anyway, so it should be researched as thoroughly as any other branch of medicine, they told a Senate subcommittee. "We are in the midst of a revolution in the practice of medicine and a transformation in the kind of health care Americans want and receive," said James Gordon, a psychiatry and familymedicine professor at Georgetown University. [continues 191 words]
She follows in the footsteps of other recent Miss Americas who have used their positions to focus on substantive issues. For example, Miss America 1996 Shawntel Smith spoke out in favor of early career training for schoolchildren, and Heather Whitestone, the deaf ballerina from Alabama, became in 1995 the first Miss America with a disability. But Shindle's choice of issues to promote during a yearlong whirl of speeches and appearances goes beyond her predecessors. At a news conference Thursday outside the Capitol, the 20yearold Northwestern University senior and former Miss Illinois pleaded with politicians and others to ``please accept the facts of this epidemic.'' [continues 332 words]
Get drugs out of kids' hands, into doctors', see if sky falls Thank you for the wellbalanced, impartial commentary on marijuana ("'Caveat emptor!' in search for truth about marijuana," Opinions, Sept. 21). It is rare to read information that is seemingly unaffected by the national hysteria generated by this hotbutton issue. I find it interesting that the piece was written by three people who work in the field of addiction and by one who works with the University of Washington's marijuanatreatment project, yet the image that I get from the article is one of a more benign and significantly lessdangerous plant than the one that has been presented to Americans by our own government. [continues 72 words]
Drug war: Criticism from the U.S. side of our long border will impede rather than improve our neighbor's efforts. Our report on U.S.Mexican counterdrug efforts submitted to Congress last month argues for continued cooperation with our southern neighbor despite shortcomings in its struggle against drug trafficking. Optimism about a serious problem need not preclude realism. Beyond evaluation, the issue here is utility. In assessing Mexico's antidrug efforts, we are not simply debating whether the cup is half empty or half full. [continues 650 words]
In the '70s, the key to untangling any political conundrum was to follow the money. In California in the '90s, it may be that the secret is to follow the smoke. State Sen. John Vasconcellos will be getting a top award next week from the liberal Drug Policy Foundation. He, in turn, will present the foundation's journalism award to Garry Trudeau, the creator of the "Doonesbury" strip. Here's the smoking press release element: Vasconcellos is getting the award for his legislative proposals supporting medical marijuana research, in the wake of Proposition 215. He is also the same fellow who crafted the California Task Force to Promote SelfEsteem, Personal and Social Responsibility, which was savagely mocked in the nation's newspaper comics pages in 1987 by . . . Garry Trudeau. [continues 64 words]
By Gene Emery BOSTON (Reuter) Vigorous enforcement of laws that ban cigarette sales to minors may do little to curb teenage smoking, according to a study released Thursday. The research, involving student surveys in six Massachusetts communities where enforcement of the law varied significantly, is the first to use a control group to guage the effectiveness of laws banning the sale of tobacco to minors. The study, published in Thursday's edition of the New England Journal of Medicine, is a setback for health officials, who have campaigned to stop cigarette sales to minors to curtail the number of new smokers. Studies show that 88 percent of smokers become hooked by age 18. [continues 438 words]
By Patricia Reaney LONDON (Reuter) Drinking moderate amounts of white wine, beer and liquor is just as effective as quaffing red wine in reducing the risk of coronary heart disease in older people, medical experts said Thursday. The cardiovascular benefits of a glass or two of red wine a day have been well documented but medical experts now say equal amounts of other alcoholic drinks are just as good. An international symposium of biologists, cardiologists, addiction specialists and sociologists found that older, high risk people who drink one to three units a day of beer, wine or liquor, are 25 percent less likely to suffer coronary heart disease (CHD) and stroke than nondrinkers. [continues 298 words]
