Page 2 - The Michigan Daily - Wednesday October 9, 1985 HEALTH 4 & FITNESS S ai Steroids aid fibrosis victims By the Associated Press BOSTON - Doses of steroids ap- pear to protect young victims of cystic firbrosis from lung damage, the PAIAX TREE RESTAURANT Authentic Middle Eastern Cuisine Featuring: " hommos, tabouli " lamb shishkebob " falafel e homemade frozen yogurt plus a large variety of other health foods EVERYTHING FRESH MADE (no preservatives) 216 S. Fourth Ave. open. Ann Arbor Mon.-Thur. 11 a.m.-9 p.m. 662-2642 Fri-Sat. 11 a.m 10 p.m. 5 minute walk from central campus single greatest cause of illness and death in this common inherited disease, researchers say. The study, conducted at Harvard University and Children's Hospital in Boston, showed that children who took the drug had healthier lungs and spent less time in the hospital than did a comparison group. AFTER FOUR YEARS, "'we felt we had to stop the study, because it was becoming so obvious that the steroid group was better. We felt we needed to open it up and let people know," said Dr. Harvey Auerbach, who directed the study. Steroids reduce inflammation, but they can cause serious side effects. The researchers said they do not recommend the drugs for routine use in cystic fibrosis until their findings are confirmed by a larger study. "We are very encouraged," said Dr. Robert Bealle of the Cystic Fibrosis Foundation. He said the foundation will finance a major study to check and expand the Harvard results. . CYSTIC FIBROSIS is the most common fatal genetic disease of whites. One in 20 Americans carries the gene for cystic fibrosis, and the disease occurs whenever a child inherits the gene from both parents. It strikes about 1 in 1,800 whites. Victims secrete thick mucus that clogs the airways of their lungs. They are also susceptible to lung infections, and most patients die of respiratory failure. They typically live until their early 20s. The latest study, published in the Sept. 28 issue of the journal Lancet, was conducted on 45 children. They were randomly assigned to receive either a cortisone-like steroid drug called prednisone or dummy placebos. THE TWO groups were alike when the study began, but after four years, there were significant differences. Saving babies is our goal! Support the March of Dimes 81IWRTH DEFECTS FOUNOATION The steroid patients' lungs were vir- tually normal, while various measures demonstrated that the comparison group's lungs were about 15 percent below normal. Youngsters who got the drug had to be admitted to the hospital a total of nine times for lung disease, compared with 35 time for the placebo group. When the study was stopped, the steroid patients "seemed to be pretty much normal, and the other group was deteriorating," said Auerbach. Youngsters received the steroids every other day, and doctors said they noticed no adverse side effects. However, the therapy can cause cataracts and diabetes, and Auerbach said he believes that continued therapy will produce some ill effects. BEALLE said his foundation is about to begin a two- or three-year study of the treatment at 10 medical centers that will enroll about 300 patients. Besides confirming the Har- vard results, the research will attem- pt to find the best effective dose and also compare steroids to ibuprofen, a non-steroidal anti-inflammatory medicine. Bealle said the foundation is not recommending that doctors adopt steroids yet as standard therapy for cystic fibrosis. "I've talked to a number of physicians, and there's a reluctance only because of the nature of steroids and the kinds of side effects they can produce," he said. Auerbach said researchers are not sure why steroids seem to help. However, he theorized that the drug may help clear the airways of Pseudomonas aeruginosa, a microbe that often causes infections in victims of the disease. ----- ---- ---------------- - DONORS NEEDED I - WE PAY CASH- Ypsilanti Plasma, Center MICHIGAN AVE. PA O * $10 bonus with this ad PEAR O * Will pay bus fare with PEARL j U-M Student I.D. 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They quoted him as saying: "I have one message. Please, please, don't try anything on my ship. Everybody is very good on the ship." The port officials said the message was apparently not directed at any particular station. Beirut port officials said they were not sure whether he was addressing the message to Cypriot, Lebanese or Syrian authorities. He just shouted - the message over the radio. Thatcher denouices British riots LONDON - Police yesterday patrolled a mostly black neighborhood hit by the British mainland's worst riots and Prime Minister Margaret Thatcher forcefully denounced the unrest as "new depths of terrorism." One policeman was killed Sunday in the rioting and his widow said she felt only "pity" for the killers who hacked her husband to death. Thatcher, in her first public statement on the unrest, backed police threats to use rubber bullets and tear gas in any new outbreaks and for- cefully condemned the riot in north London - the fifth to hit Britain in a month. Police in British cities traditionally have dealt with rioters and other crimes without firearms or tear gas. "They have sunk to new depths of terrorism. We have to fight it," she told reporters at her Conservative Party's annual convention meeting in the seaside town of Blackpool. More than 500 riot police, equipped with floodlights and shields, kept guard throughout the early hours yesterday in the Tottenham section - the scene of fierce rioting that began Sunday and raged into the early hours of Monday. Amnesty reports official deaths LONDON - Thousands of people worldwide were killed last year as a result of government policies allowing the execution, torture or assassination of criminals and political opponents, Amnesty Inter- national said today. In a report reviewing the human rights records of 123 countries in 1984, the London-based group said it was impossible to provide an exact figure because "secrecy concealed many deaths and government denied responsibility for killings carried out on their orders or with their com- plicity." Amnesty - basing part of its report on information from 40 countries - said it counted 1,513 official executions in 1984, including 21 in the United States, 16 in the Soviet Union and 114 in South Africa. Thousands more peope were "the victims of deliberate political killings in various countries," the organization said in the 359-page report. Two British hostages released BEIRUT, Lebanon - Two British women who were kidnapped in Moslem west Beirut 13 days ago, were released yesterday. They ap- peared shaken, but apparently unharmed. The women, 28-year-old Amanda McGrath, a teacher at the American University of Beirut's intensive English program, and Hazel Moss, 45, a former restaurant manager, were freed near the Commodore Hotel in Moslem west Beirut late in the evening. Associated Press reporters who saw the women said they showed no obvious signs of having been phsyically mistreated. Both immediately called their families in England. "I am fine. We've just been released," McGrath told her father. "I am well and I even gained weight. I wasn't hurt." The two said they did not know who their captors were. Police in Beirut repoted Sept. 26 that the women were seen being pushed into a car oustide of their Makhous Street apartment by men ar- med with pistols and an AK-47 assault rifle. Still missing are a British journalist and 11 other Westerners, all men, kidnapped in west Beirut since March 1984. Six are Americans, four are French and one is Italian. Reagan program may have hurt farm exports, spokesmen say WASHINGTON - The Reagan Administration's. $2 billion program to rescue sagging U.S. farm exports may instead have damaged overseas sales because it has angered America's best customers, grain industry spokesmen told Congress yesterday. "The program has turned out to be a miserable failure that has...an- tagonized our traditional customers and lost more business than it has gained," said J. Stephen Gabbert, executive vice president of the Rice Millers Association. Farm exports are the largest single positive influence on the U.S. trade balance, but they have slipped in the past four years. Export value this year is projected at $32 billion, down from a 1981 peak of $43.8 billion. Reasons for the slide range from the high value of the U.S. dollar and relatively high domestic price supports to slack demand due to a world economic slump and massive overproduction that has led to huge sur- pluses. In response, the Reagan administration on May 15 announced a $2 billion plan to rescue exports by subsidizing them with surplus gover- nment commodities. "We will be going on the attack in the international marketplace," Agriculture Secretary John Block said at the time. Q he Michigan 13at-1 Vol XCVI- No. 25 The Michigan Daily (ISSN 0745-967 X) is published Monday through Friday during the Fall and Winter terms. Subscription rates: September through April - $18.00 in Ann Arbor; $35.00 outside the city. One term - $10.00 in town; $20.00 out of town. The Michigan Daily is a member of The Associated Press and Sub- scribes to United Press International, Pacific News Service, Los Angeles Times Syndicate, and College Press Service. 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LIBERTY (2 blks. off State) WOMEN'S KARATE SELF DEFENSE t'.1 1R Editor in Chief....................NEIL CHASE Opinion Page Editor............JOSEPH KRAUS Managing Editors-.........GEORGEA KOVANIS JACKIE YOUNG News Editor................. THOMAS MILLER Features Editor-.............LAURIE DELATER City Editor ................. ANDREW ERIKSEN Personnel Editor....-.........TRACEY MILLER NEWS STAFF: Jody Becker, Laura Bischoff, Nancy Driscoll, Carla Folz, Rachel Gottlieb, Sean Jackson, David Klapman, Vibeke Laroi. Carrie Levine, Jerry Markon, Eric Mattson, Amy Mindell, Kery Mura- kami, Christy Reidel, Stacey Shonk, Katie Wilcox. Magazine Editor.......... RANDALL STONE Arts Editor--s-----d----------CHRIS LAUER Associate Arts Editors------------..JOHN LOGIE Movies.................. BYRON L. BULL Records-................... BETH FERTIG Books------------------..RON SCHECHTER Theatre--------------NOELLE BROWER Sports Editor.................. TOM KEANEY Associate Sports Editors ............. 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