- The ARC - California Edition -

Food for Preventive Thought

Garage Door Safety
With garage doors, you should make certain that young children and other persons that cannot fend for themselves are not entrapped by this technology. As a prevention advocate, you can take steps to make absolutely sure that the reversing controls are set at a very sensitive level.

The door should close properly, and it should reverse immediately if physically blocked by any object. When operating this type of powered mechanism, caution is strongly urged when youngsters (or any person that otherwise requires supervision) are nearby these potentially dangerous systems.

Poisoning of Children
In January of this year, a 15-month-old child from the city of Bakersfield, California, died of "IRON POISONING". The reason this child died was because he swallowed about 20 adult-dosed iron supplement tablets.

Tests conducted after his death showed evidence that this very young boy had an iron level in his bloodstream that was well over what is considered normal for a child his age.

Normal expectations for the iron level in his blood would be to contain between 40 and 100 unit grams of iron per deciliter of blood. But tests conducted on baby Christopher Rivera’s blood found it to have an iron level of 12,000 unit grams per deciliter of blood.

Kern county Sheriff’s department representatives ascertained that the deceased child and his two older sisters had gotten into iron tablets they had found in the family medicine cabinet.

Death and Injury
Motor vehicle collisions are a leading cause of death in North America, accounting for one death every 10 minutes. Over the past 25 years, meaningful progress has been made in reducing the risk of death and injury through vehicle improvements, roadway changes, and many other similar safety design initiatives. But sometimes technology can increase the risk of death and injury.

Researchers recently reported in the New England Journal of Medicine about a strong link between cellular-telephone calls and motor vehicle collisions. Their conclusion is that the use of cellular telephones in motor vehicles is associated with a quadrupling of the risk of a collision during the brief period of a call. (Donald A. Redelmeier and Robert J. Tibshirani; Association Between Cellular-Telephone Calls and Motor Vehicle Collisions. NEJM, Volume 336, Number 7, February 13, 1997)

Older Men Cause Most Teen Births
During the past year, the state has been funding some counties to enable them to establish "Statutory Rape Prosecution Units". Statutory rape laws have been on the books in California for years, but with the increase in violent crimes most county prosecutors do not give priority to enforcing such laws.

The deputy county prosecutors assigned to carry out this new program reported that they have been surprised by what they’ve learned during their first year. "Over half of teen pregnancy problems are caused by men over 25 years old." Are you surprised?

Genetics and Public Policy
The Senate Select Committee on Genetics and Public Policy announces the availability of the 1996 reports of the informational series, "Truth and Consequences of the Genetic Revolution." Two of the three reports may be of interest to Arc members.

Informational hearing 1 - April 8, 1996 "Human Genetic Research". Publication 893-S.

Informational hearing 2 - May 9, 1996 "DNA on Trial". Publication 894-S.

The reports each include background information, transcript text, recommendations for legislation and a summary of genetics-related legislation for the 1995-96 California legislative sessions.

Either report costs $4.31 (incl. S&H) and can be ordered from: Senate Publications, 1020 "N" Street, Room B-53, Sacramento, CA., 95814.