By The Associated Press Edited by Tabitha Hiner Study:Stress may double riskof cold BOSTON - The s«||^of such problems as losing a job^reaking off an engagement or simply feeling overwhelmed by life’s taudens nearly doubles the risk of catching a cold, a study has found, “It is the first evidence for an asso ciation between stress and a biologi cally verifiable infectious disease,” said the study’s director, Dr. Sheldon Cohen of Carnegie Mellon Univer sity in Pittsburgh. Some experts have long believed that chronic stress weakens people’s defenses against disease. But while circumstantial evidence of this idea has built up in recent years, there has been little direct proof that stress l actually makes people sick. Now a unique, carefully conducted study suggests just this: When other wise healthy people are equally ex posed to germs, those under stress are more likely to catch them. The study exposed 394 volunteers to equal doses of five different cold bugs. Typically in such experiments, about 35 percent to 40 percent come down with the sriiffles. This study, however, showed that the risk is strongly associated with the amount of stress people encounter in their daily lives. Among those under the most stress, 47 percent caught colds, compared with 27 percent under the least stress. The study was conducted at the Medical Research Council Common Cold Unit in Salisbury, England, and published in today’s New England Journal of Medicine. The researchers calculated a nu merical stress level for each volun teer by questioning them about such burdensome events during the previ ous year as moving, being fired, chang ing jobs, having a child, getting an abortion, suffering a burglary or ex periencing a death in the family. They also asked if the volunteers had trouble coping with life’s de mands as well as whether they often felt such dark emotions as anger, depression, nervousness and guilt. GNPfinishes third consecutive below average quarter Stress and Colds The more stress in people’s lives, the more likely they were to become infected with cold viruses. Stress raised the chance of catching all five viruses tested. Rhinovirus is the most common virus to cause colds. Percentage of study subjects with colds HLow stress High stress 'I Rhinovirus-Rhinovirus Respiratory Rhinovirus CoronavimVb ~ Type 2 Type 9 syncytial Type 14 virus » Source: New England Journal of Medicine ~ jUovemment says national recession may cunuiiue j WASHINGTON - The U.S. econ omy contracted at a slight 0.1 percent annual rate in the April-June quarter, the government said Wednesday, casting doubt on whether the nation has emerged from the recession. The Commerce Department said the gross national product, the most widely watched measure of economic health, posted a third consecutive negative quarter. Econonvc activity slumped a sharp 2.8 percent in the first quarter of this year and declined 1.6 percent in the last three months of 1990. The second-quarter drop marked a sharp revision from the government’s original estimate of a 0.4 percent advance, which was greeted last month as evidence the economy was climb ing out of its first recession in eight years. The report was seen as strengthen ing the argument of some economists who believe the economy is in danger of lapsing into a so-called double-dip recession, in which a brief period of revival is followed by a fresh down turn. In advance, most analysis ex pected little revision in the earlier estimate. The department attributed the revision to weakcr-than-expected production of goods for inventories and a more modest gain in consumer spending than first thought. The first change, on inventories, could turn out to be a favorable devel opment for the economy. Lean inven lories mean any pickup in sales will quickly translate into increased pro duction at factories and eventually into more jobs. However, the 2.8 percent growth in consumer spending, instead of the 3.6 percent growth estimated earlier, was viewed more seriously, even though the department allributol some of it to a shift of car and automobile purchases from the consumer sector to the business sector. Consumer spending represents two thirds of all economic activity and its revival is considered the key to any lasting economic recovery. In another sign of the recession’s impact, the department said that af ter-tax profits of U.S. corporations fell 1.6 percent to $163.7 billion in the April-Junc period, the lowest level since the third quarter of 1989. How ever, the drop was less severe than the 6.3 percent decline in the first quar ter Deadly crash Crack vial found in cab of derailed subway train in New York NEW YORK - A subway train jumped the tracks and slammed into a pillar today, killing at least five people and injuring 171, officials said. The motorman was reported missing for hours, and sources said a crack vial was found in the cab. The 12:15 a.m. accident occurred as a 10-car downtown train was ap proaching Manhattan’s busy 14th Street-Union Square station. The crash sheared the lead car in half, and pas sengers were trapped in the twisted steel for hours. The train “was going so fast, the next thing you know it was boom,’” said passenger Albert Webb, 30. He said he saw a baby hurled from its mother’s arms. “It was like an explosion,” said passenger Joseih Ricketts, who had bloody knees and a tom dress. “Some people from another car got thrown into our car. There was a lot of smoke. The car was just shredded. There were wires hanging down. People were H L screaming." The train’s motorman, who left the accident scene and was missing for several hours, was later located by Cslice and was being questioned, said L Robert Nardoza. Authorities with held the motorman’s name. Two sources involved in the in vestigation told The Associated Press that an empty crack vial had been found on the floor of the cab, which was intact after the accident. The sources spoke to The AP on condition of anonymity. Investigators were also looking into reports that the motorman skipped a couple of stops early in the route and was traveling too fast. Deputy Fire Commissioner Tom Kelly said the train looked like “a collapsed telescope.” The first car of the train was slit in half and the back was shredded. Police said they be lieved the last of the victims trapped in the wreckage was out by about 5 a.m. »» VI V IIIIVU V/Ul Wl the tunnel on stretchers, others were treated at the station and still others were led onto buses and taken to hospitals. Kelly said five people were killed. The Emergency Medical Service reported 171 people were injured, 12 critically. The injured included 34 police officers treated at the scene for heat and smoke injuries. The cause of the derailment was not immediately known, said TA spokesman-Bob Slovak. The accident occurred about 200 feet north of the station as the train was crossing from -express to local tracks, said TA spokeswoman Carcn Gardner. The first five cars derailed, and the lead car slammed into a pillar] she said. The speed of the train was not known, Slovak said. The accident occurred at one of . the. busiest stations on one of the busiest lines of the subway system, the Lexington Avenue line. The 14th Street stop is a major transfer point. New York’s worst subway acci dent occurred in 1918 when a train derailed in Brooklyn, killing 92 people Two people were killed and about 150 injured in December in a fire in a subway tunnel between Manhattan and Brooklyn. Students supplied with books, pens, drug treatment insurance LITTLE ROCK, Ark. (AP) - When a new year of classes began this week, students in Little Rock schools got something besides books and assignments: complete insur ance coverage for drug and alco hol-abuse treatment. City and school officials worked with the Blue Cross and Blue Shield of Arkansas insurance company to provide 100 percent coverage for the district’s 26,000 students. “Itproviaesour youngsters with an opportunity to receive help,” said Jo Evelyn Elston, the district’s director of pupil services. Abuse of drugs and alcohol is “a problem we’ve not been able to ad dress in the past for not having the resources to get these children into the programs that they needed,” she said. The student-insurance program, called “Fight Back! Insure the Chil dren,” will provide services for al cohol and drug abusers, ranging from education and early interven tion to intensive treatment. It also includes family-therapy coverage. One student was referred to the program Monday, the first day of school, Elston said. The referral came to the district from a commu nity agency where the student had sought help. The student will get help from an agency that has agreed to participate in the program, she said. “The agency that referred (him) could not have provided the serv- I ice,” she said. Among other treat- I j meni, Elston said, the student was I l recommended for three group ses sions three times a week, for up to eight weeks. The school district hired three people on Monday to assess and refer children to the program. In April, city and school district officials announced a drive to raise money to pay for the program. Par ents were asked to donate $10 a child. But the effort fell short. The district raised only $68,728, and almost failed to meet Monday’s deadline for the first of two $133,500 premiums due to Blue Cross and Blue Shield of Arkansas. The premium was paid with help from an $80,000 interest-free loan from Twin City Bank of North Little Rock. “The summer was really a bad time to start,” said Frankie Sarver, executive director of the Fighting Back Initiative. Now that school has started, she said, she expects parent-teacher associations to help raise additional money. The school program grew outol the work of Little Rock Fighting Back, a coalition of community leaders and city officials. The coa lition operates under a $200,000 grant from the Robert Wood Johnson Foundation of Princeton, N.J. 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