MIAMI, Fla. — An all-volunteer medical team here has embarked on the latest of a series of humanitarian missions to El Salvador to help fight the dengue epidemic, which the Pan American Health Organization says has resulted in an estimated 1,300 people in the country suffering from the disease.

Meanwhile, the head of the organization warned that the impact of the disease is spreading south perhaps as far as Costa Rica.

The non-profit Miami Medical Team Foundation, founded in 1983, is a group of physicians who volunteer on missions to help victims of epidemics, local wars, and natural disasters. The group is making the trip to El Salvador at the invitation of the Salvadoran government to treat those with dengue, a mosquito-borne disease which causes high fever and severe dehydration. A more serious strain of dengue can cause death. The team left here Thursday.

On June 13, El Salvador's President Francisco Flores declared a state of emergency in the departments of San Salvador, La Libertad, Santa Ana, and Cabanas, with a caution alert issued for the rest of the country. The health organization said dengue is a chronic problem in El Salvador and outbreaks peak during the rainy season, which usually runs from May to October. 

Children between the ages of 5 and 9 are most affected. In an interview, Miami Medical Foundation President Manuel Alzugaray, an orthopedist, said his team plans to make another trip to El Salvador starting July 4, with later trips also planned to that country. Alzugaray said the team that left Thursday consisted of four doctors, a nurse, and a logistics expert. It is urgently needed

On a recently completed trip to El Salvador, Alzugaray's team included the chief air pilot for the Miami-Dade County mosquito control department, and an entomologist from the county's mosquito control section.

Alzugaray said El Salvador's dengue epidemic represents a "very serious situation" and that the disease is spreading into Honduras and Nicaragua, with some parts of Guatemala and possibly Costa Rica also affected. The disease could also threaten South Florida and U.S. states along the Gulf of Mexico because of the high number of people who travel to those areas from Central America, some of whom might be carrying dengue, said Alzugaray.

Alzugaray said the most serious victims of dengue become dehydrated, with uncontrollable temperatures and hemorrhaging.

To combat the illness, his group donates intravenous solutions, anti-fever medications, antibiotics, multivitamins, nutrients, and other medications. Measures to stop the spread of the disease include mosquito repellent, anti-mosquito aerosols, mosquito nets, and plastic mesh to cover windows and doors.

The cycle of dengue disease begins when a mosquito deposits eggs in stagnating waters. The eggs become larvae and then evolve into mosquitoes. 

Adult mosquitoes hide in humid and dark places in houses, buildings, and bushes during the day, and bite their victims at night. Efforts to control mosquitoes include fumigating houses, buildings and surrounding areas, and airplanes spraying the countryside.

The Instituto Costarricense de Electricidad said Thursday it would be strong defenders of the environment and require its subcontractors to be the same.

The institute also said that it would adopt a more harmonious and transparent attitude with the people who live in the communities affected by its projects.

The institute runs the telephone system and the electrical generating facilities in Costa Rica. It also is parent to Radiográfica Costarricense S.A., the Internet company.

The company said that it has tried to use a strategy of generating energy through renewable sources. But its board of directors passed a strong environmental measure March 19 requiring the company to conduct its activities based on the fundamental principals of sustainable development and conservation, protection, recovery and responsible use of the environment.

Pablo Cobb, executive president of the board, said that the independent institute was aware of the strong emphasis that the new president Abel Pacheco was putting on environmental protection. Pacheco has proposed putting stiff protections in the Costa Rican Constitution. 

Cobb said that ICE would adhere to international environmental norms and standards. The institute builds high tension lines, hydroelectric plants, thermal electric plants, dams and other massive projects that have heavy impact on the environment. Cobb said that such impact was unavoidable but promised that ICE would be as sensitive as possible.

The institute has been criticized for a high-handed attitude in dealing with individuals and groups in communities affected by the high profile projects. The Borucas Project in southern Costa Rica requires a dam to create a lake bigger than Lake Arenal. The Indian residents there said they have been slighted by ICE.

Cobb promised a better dialogue and a better consensus with the indigenous peoples. After the public meeting at which the promises were presented Hernan Bravo, vice president of the board, said that a thermal generating plant in northern Costa Rica also has caused similar local concerns.

Court cuts counts
in abduction case

Michael Louis is a U.S. citizen detained in Moravia in north San José because he fled from the St. Louis, Mo., area with his two children from the United States without permission of his ex-wife and the courts.

After he was captured here and his children returned to the mother, he became a resident of San Sebastian, the prison south of downtown, and the U.S. government began extradition proceedings against him to bring him back to face 14 charges ranging from parental adoption to racketeering.

The Costa Rican criminal court dismissed all but two charges in an extradition hearing this week, according to the man’s lawyer, Arcelio Hernández Mussio.

The lawyer also said he would file an appeal to get the two remaining charges thrown out.

The dismissal means that Louis may only be tried in the United States on the two remaining charges, the lawyer said. The two remaining charges are parental abduction, resulting from taking the children to Costa Rica.

Another source said that Costa Rican law does not recognize parental abduction and, as a result, the case brought by the U.S. government might not result in extradition. Costa Rica only will extradite if the charge alleged is a crime here.

The charges that the U.S. government brought against Louis ranged from tampering with a witness, to structuring transactions to evade reporting requirements, to interstate and foreign travel or transportation in aid of racketeering enterprises, according to his lawyer.

Investigators in Limón used a sting operation to round up three men to face investigation for vehicle theft and extortion, agents said Thursday.

One man who was arrested is the retired comandante of the Fuerza Pública region centered in Limón. 

Agents expanded on the arrest Thursday. They said the case began Monday when a Kia Exportage was stolen in the center of Limón about noon.

A short time later the owner of the vehicle got a telephone call saying that the thieves would return the vehicle if 500,000 colons ransom were paid. Otherwise, the vehicle would be torched, agents said. That amount is about $1,400. This newspaper incorrectly reported the amount as 50,000 colons in Thursday’s edition.

The owner contacted police who determined that the call originated at a public telephone in front of the former railway station in the city. That’s where the vehicle owner told thieves he would deliver the money to get the vehicle back, agents said. The exchange was to be Tuesday.

When the suspects made the pickup at the same telephone they were arrested, and the car was found in a parking lot nearby, said investigators for the Judicial Investigating Organization.

The spokesman for investigators identified the former top policeman in the region as Francisco Noguera Solís, 43, who was head of the Limón district in 1997 and 1999. Also arrested was Francisco Noguera Rosalis, 18 and Michael Guillen Thompson, also 18.
 

New memory idea
may reduce computers

BUFFALO, N.Y. — U.S. researchers have developed a magnetic sensor only a few atoms in diameter that could increase data storage capacity by a factor of a thousand and could ultimately lead to supercomputing devices as small as a wristwatch.

According to researchers at the State University of New York here in Buffalo, they have demonstrated that their tiny sensor, made of nickel, produces a 3,000-per cent change in resistance in an ultra-small magnetic field.

As stored "bits" of data get smaller their magnetic field gets weaker, making the bits harder to detect and "read." Reliable reading of the data depends on producing a large enough magnetically-induced change in the electrical resistance of the sensor.

The current technology used in the heads, or sensors, that read bits from a storage disk is based on an effect called "giant" magnetoresistance. Inside a hard drive, a GMR device senses the local magnetic field of a stored bit of data.

The effect created with the new nickel device is called "ballistic" magnetoresistance and employs an electrical conductor that is only a few atoms wide and long. Researchers predict that the new sensor could enable the storage of 50 or more digital video disk full-length movies on a hard drive the size of a credit card. Current commercial sensors enable the storage of a single DVD movie on a hard drive.

Besides being useful for the multi-billion-dollar data storage industry, the techniques could improve magnetic measurements and the study of magnetic effects in individual atoms.

Summit wrapped up
in northern Canada

World leaders meeting in Canada have wrapped up their summit expressing confidence in the world economy and a commitment to fighting terrorism. In a summary from Canadian Prime Minister Jean Chretien, the G-8 leaders said they are confident in the economies of their countries, and in the prospects for worldwide economic growth. 

They say they are committed to bringing terrorists to justice, and to reducing the threat of terrorist attacks. 

Earlier, the leaders of seven of the world's main industrialized countries pledged $20 billion in aid to the newest G-8 member, Russia. The money will be used to help Russia decommission nuclear weapons over the next decade, and keep them from falling into terrorist hands. 

Meanwhile, the summit's host, Canadian Prime Minister Jean Chretien, announced that the world's leading industrialized countries will support development aid for Africa. The new agreement offers an unspecified amount of increased aid and foreign investments to countries that weed out government corruption and pursue free market reforms. 

It was reached following a meeting between G-8 leaders, United Nations Secretary General Kofi Annan and the presidents of Algeria, Nigeria, Senegal and South Africa. 

In the closing summary, G-8 leaders say urgent reforms are needed in Palestinian political and security institutions and the Palestinian economy. The leaders say they want the Palestinians to carry out free and fair elections. 

The leaders also said Pakistan must put a permanent stop to terrorist activity originating from its territory. They urged Pakistan and India to engage in a sustained dialogue to work out their disputes. 

G-8 members are Britain, Canada, France, Germany, Italy, Japan, Russia and the United States.

Marchers remain peaceful

BUENOS AIRES, Argentina —  Thousands of anti-government marchers demonstrated their anger toward the country's president but remained peaceful thursday. They were protesting the deaths of two people as police tried to break up a riot the day before. 

Thousands of protesters told President Eduardo Duhalde it is time to go. Some carried signs calling him an assassin. But on Thursday night no violence was reported as picketers filled the streets here, protesting the deadly violence of a day earlier.