The Michigan Daily - Monday,_March 7, 1994 - 3 'U' study: Alcohol intake aggravates injuries incurred in auto accidents JOE WESTRATE/Daily University Law School graduate, William M. Brodhead, addresses students in the Union yesterday. Brodhead is campaigning for the U.S. Senate. Grad gar erS Student support for U.S. Senate By MAGGIE WEYHING DAILY STAFF REPORTER Bill Brodhead, a 1967 University Lawgrad, came to the Michigan Union last night to tell about 40 University students he needs their help to become Michigan's newest U.S. senator. He hopes to replace U.S. Sen. Donald Riegle (D-Flint) in the November election. Brodhead, a Democrat and six- year member of the U.S. House, called for a "major shift in priorities" by the federal government. He explained that more money and time should be invested in young people. Brodhead expressed his fervent support for "Head Start," a federally funded program that supports needy students beginning at the age of three. Brodhead said the federal government should provide money for students who want to continue their education after high school, but cannot for lack of money. "We are the richest country in the world, no one should be denied higher education because they don't have enough money. I know that these programs are going to cost billions, but it will be money well-spent," he said. Brodhead complimented President Clinton's courage to address the health care issue and encouraged students to support his efforts. He tied the welfare problem directly to the problem of health care, saying the cure for one would ultimately be the ,ame for the other. He explained that health care should be made available for everyone. "We have the most expensive health care system in the world. There are 39 million U.S. citizens who don't have any health care protection. Eighty percent of the people who don't have protection are the working poor who are trying to better themselves." Brodhead emphasized the need for the re-development of the economy of the state. He said he supports the development of tax incentives that would provide for investment in job creation. Brodhead also side-stepped some issues raised by the audience. "iThe legalization of drugs would certainly reduce the crime rate, but it would also increase drug use, which is something that I don't think our society is ready for!" Although assisted suicide is not yet a federal issue, Brodhead recognized its national importance. "If a person wants to commit suicide, they should be able to. However, some people become depressed or vulnerable and can then be taken advantage of - we need to write a law that would protect people who are vulnerable." By RACHEL SCHARFMAN DAILY STAFF REPORTER An ongoing study at the University has concluded that alcohol - a factor in more than half of motor vehicle crashes involving people under the age of 20 - exacerbates injuries incurred in automotive accidents. "Alcohol worsens any injury from an impact - it renders the person more vulnerable," said Patricia Waller, director of the University Transportation Research Institute, in a report issued by the University's Medical Center. Waller is currently chief investigator of the three-year study by the Medical Center's Department of Emergency Services and Alcohol Research Center. The study aims to discern the biological ramifications of cocaine, marijuana and alcohol use on bodily reactions to injury. Unlike other injury studies, the extensive research currently being conducted takes into account many variables. Among the factors being considered by the team are the immediate circumstances of the Spielberg revives talk of Holocaust in Germany LOS ANGELES TIMES FRANKFURT, Germany-Young Germans often call it "the big silence." At home, among family, talk of the Holocaust was taboo. Children learned quickly that the subject was too painful, too shameful for their parents and grandparents to face. And most stopped asking. Now, Steven Spielberg, an Ameri- can film director who lost 10 relatives in the Holocaust, gives them "Schindler's List" and tells them that it is not only OK to ask questions, it is essential to look history in the eye with- out shame. "Germany is ready and waiting and willing - the new generation of Germans-to look at their past and not put it behind them but bring it with them throughout their lives," Spielberg said at the film's German premiere Tuesday in this city where Schindler spent his last years. "Not as a way of paying penance or expressing guilt or shame but as a way of understanding that we cannot put the present or future to right until we make peace with our past." Will his messagebe heeded? Seldom in Germany has a film generated such emotion and soul-searching as "Schindler's List," the storyofthe "good German," entrepreneur Oskar Schindler, who did what most Germans could not or would not do: Save Jews from the Nazi extermination. "Everyone should see this film," the conservative daily newspaper Frankfurter Allgemeine stated categorically in a front-page review. Spielberg's film "is an event of contemporary history," added the liberal Die Zeit newspaper critic. But at the same time, many German reviewers are askingwhy a German has never made this film. And some Germans say "Schindler's List" is too long and too sad to bother seeing. As in other countries, German audiences are filing out of theaters at the end of the three-hour film in stunned silence, like mourners leaving a funeral. "I am totally shattered," Thomas Schreier, an insurance agent, said after opening night in Berlin. The film gives Germans a hero through which they can look at the Holocaust, a pain-reliever they have not always had. But it also raises uncomfortable questions: If Schindler resisted the Nazis, why didn't so many others? accident at the moment of impact. These include the crash scale employed by police, which measures the severity of impact on a scale from one to seven and the physical location of the impact. These determinants are of critical importance, as the force of impact and the specific organs damaged are closely linked to the body's reaction to injury. Accordingly, automobile accidents provide the perfect models for studying these physiological reactions. "The motor vehicle crash gives you a ready-made model because it has the independent measures that enable you to get a rough estimate of the physical forces involved. There is no other injury type for which you can do that," Waller said. Since alcohol is a contributory factor in at least 320,000 automotive accidents each year, the pool of available case studies is abundant. To date, 1,250 patients have been studied, with a projected goal of 1,500 victims to be examined by the end of the study next year. The process of examination LET'S GO PLAY involves blood-drawing and in-depth interviews conducted by social workers, which aim to establish what, if any, history of alcohol or drug abuse exists. The interview also attempts to discern whether a difference between the effects of chronic vs. sporadic drinking injuries exists. "It may be that people with higher blood alcohol levels at the time of the crash have a heavier drinking history and have developed a better tolerance that enables their body to respond better. We don't know for sure," Waller stated. This type of ambiguity has been a stumbling block in the study's progress, noted Dr. Ron Maio, the project's principal. co-investigator. While he said he is certain that long- term drinking effects blood coagulation, he said there "is not an exact linear relationship" binding the severity of injury to the amount of alcohol consumption or the length of alcohol history of the patient. However, Maio did state conclusively that "alcohol potentates injury." This conclusion is supported by the animal research by Dr. Brian Zink, an emergency medicine specialist. These studies also aim to measure the effects of alcohol on bodily reactions to injury, but are performed on laboratory pigs that are anesthetized, then hit with machines which deliver mechanically controlled blows. Half of the specimens are used as controls, the other half given alcohol. The results of the tests confirmed that alcohol exaggerates injury. Zink's findings, noted in the report, state that alcohol intake prolongs the period of apnea, or cessation of breathing, which commonly occurs after a brain injury. In addition, intoxication will accelerate the shock process, disrupt cardiac regulation, and aggravate spinal swelling, should any occur. Should the final study results show that even low levels of alcohol consumption significantly "enhance injury" and raise hospital costs, the research team expects Michigan would be more apt to lower the legal blood alcohol limit from its present level of 0.1 percent. SARAH WHITING/Daily First-year student Abigail Goodman and her dog, Lucky, enjoy the warmth of the sun on the Diag yesterday. New Yorkers mourn death of Hasidic youth Local lobbying organization voices concerns of homeless By REBECCA GORDON FOR THE DAILY Seated in a small room every Thursday afternoon, Paul Lambert works to alleviate Ann Arbor's homelessness problem. Lambert is an active member of the Homeless Action Committee (HAC) - an organization that advocates aid for the homeless. Its tactics include lobbying to influence government policies to provide additional services for the 1,500 homeless in Ann Arbor. One of the committee's main projects was to put pressure on the city to reopen the Ann Arbor Inn. Once a 202-room hotel, the Ann Arbor Innwas vacated four years ago after its owners declared bankruptcy. The Ann Arbor City Council endorsed a plan Nov. 15 only recently finalized to convert the inn to housing units for low-income senior citizens. HAC members said they do not believe the housing plan was a victory. "Many homeless people will still not be able to afford the rents that the Inn charges," Lambert said. HAC also picketed Great Lakes Bancorp, trying to get the bank to lower its mortgage rates. HAC member Jeri Schneider said that while "direct services are important to deal with short term effects of homelessness, in order to deal with long term effects one has to look at the root of the problem, such as uneven distribution of wealth." This is the reason why the committee has chosen not to be a service-providing organization, she said. There are other organizations in Ann Arbor that concentrate upon providing direct service to the homeless in the city. The Ann Arbor Shelter on Huron Street offers a warm place for the homeless to rest safely. The hours of the shelter have been extended on weekends during the winter months. Also, the Interfaith Hospital Network is an organization that provides a different church each week in which homeless families are able to sleep. NEWSDAY NEW YORK - The wide boule- vard of Eastern Parkway was thick with mourners yesterday, its great breadth swelled with grieving Jews who walked behind and beside the shroud-draped casket of Aaron Halberstam. Thousands of people jostledto touch the coffin of the Hasidic 16-year-old who died Saturday night from wounds he suffered in a shooting last week on the Brooklyn Bridge. Aaron's parents, crying and bent with grief, released a statement saying that the suspected killer should be charged as a terrorist and put to death for killing their boy. "There must be consequences for this untimely and brutal murder so that a clear message is sent that wanton violence and anarchy will not be toler- ated on American soil," the statement read. New York Gov. Mario Cuomo and Mayor Rudolph Giuliani attended the ceremony, but did not make any com- ments as part of the service. In a separate statement, a spokes- person for the Lubavitch movement described the young man as "a martyr who died because he was a Jew." Aaron's place in the Hasidic com- munity is a special one, because he was taught as a young boy by Rabbi Menachem Schneerson, the leader of the Lubavitch sect believed by the de- vout to be the Messiah. Police are holding Rashid Baz, a 28- year-old Lebanese-born taxi driver, in the shooting of Aaron and three other boys who were traveling in a van full of 15 young Hasidic Jews. Two other men with allegedly lesser roles in the attack are also being held. No motives were officially ascribed in the attack, although some have specu- lated the shooting was a retaliation for the mass shooting by an American- born Jewish physician at an Arab mosque in Hebron in the Israeli-occu- pied West Bank. As of last night, police had not amended charges of attempted murder against Baz to include murder. Law- enforcement officials said that a grand jury will determine what, if any, further charges will be filed against Baz. Aaron's coffin was unloaded from a hearse yesterday afternoon in front of the six-story brick apartment building off Brooklyn Avenue where the Halberstams live as his father, Chespd, his mother, Devorah, and four siblings looked on. Several Hasidic men in dark coats and hats hoisted the coffin onto their shoulders and began walking along the parkway one block east to Kingston Avenue, site ofthe Lubavitch sect head- quarters. Stop the madness! Be a graphic designer in The Michigan Daily Ad Production Department next fall! 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