Winnipeg Free Press

Winnipeg Free Press (Newspaper) - December 11, 1981, Winnipeg, Manitoba Winnipeg free december 1981 3 rare birth disorder difficult to researchers find re ruin with Missine or malformed Mph Imi torm tar on by Joe Rubin a team of researchers is having trouble isolating cases of omphale a rare birth disorder detected at local because certain congenital defects Are investigators Are hav ing difficulty deciding the Type of cases to be included in the said Albert de a Boniface Hospital the doctors Are examining the Inci Dence of babies born with intestines protruding through the Abdomen and City Hall notebook garbage positions junked although 27 positions of garbage col Lection Helper will be Cut with the Purchase of 18 one person refuse no permanent City employee will be out of a spokesman in the City operations department said some staff displacement will occur As employees in the deleted positions Are moved to other jobs in the civic whenever new such As the is the City relies on staff turnover and additional training to minimize the Impact on its work he executive policy committee yester Day approved deletion of the 27 Helper each of which commands a wage of every two the total savings to the City will be not All the 27 deleted positions Are the spokesman he said All the 18 Side loaders Are expected to be in service by years As the City will have 35 rear loaders in using two or three Man two Side loaders were leased in 1980 on a trial with the operators performing the dual role of driving and loading the refuse whether the City buys More Side loaders depends on their performance and the spokesman he said some rear loaders always will be needed for Container Type garbage City hiring equal rights coordinator the hiring of an equal Opportunity program coordinator for the City of Winnipeg was approved yesterday by executive policy the position will be added to the permanent establishment of the personnel since an employee of the health department has been seconded to serve in the which will be Bull tined now for a permanent the cites equal Opportunity employ ment program is designed to ensure nondiscriminatory Selec Tion and promotion within the civic service consistent with existing labor the coordinator is responsible for implementation and review of the pro Gram in conjunction with the personnel department and other City depart policy committee also directed the Board of commissioners to report Back on the feasibility of adding the duties of the cites human resources coordinator to the new with missing or malformed de who noted an increase in the incidence of the usually fatal dior said the team met this week to get a picture of the situation in about 12 cases have been noted at the health sciences Centre and Boni face Hospital in the last two with seven cases detected at Boniface alone in the year to no cases have been seen in the province since and some mothers of malformed offspring have gone on to deliver Normal the incidence of Ompha locales the medical term for an abdominal protrusion of the intestine is about one in three to eight cases Are normally seen each year in doctors say babies born with Ompha locales in conjunction with other abnormalities skeletal Imperforate kidney and bladder disorders Are rarer of the seven babies delivered at Boniface with most had other one had a missing right Arm while lower limbs were absent in two the severity of the associated abnormalities in these babies and the relatively High number born in such a Short time prompted the de Pape said the higher Hanaver age incidence at Boniface could be attributed to its caseload of High risk pregnancies from Rural a similar increase has not been recorded at the health sciences which also handles High risk it May be one of those flukey freaks which happens at one Hospital and not de Pape investigators do not agree that the James free press among the thousands of packages passing through the Winnipeg Post office Are a surprising number containing foodstuffs destined for Christmas packages for Poland add to Post offices annual Rush Post office officials expect Between 60 and 70 million pieces of pre Christmas mail will pass through the Central Winnipeg including an unusual number of packages Des tined for per Public relations spokesman for the Post said yesterday an additional 45 temporary employees have been hired to Cope with the Christmas while staff Are being offered the Opportunity to work extensive Over time Holting said the expected Levels of about the same As last will not pose too great a problem because the Post office has been successful in its Campaign to inform customers about using sealed mail for Christmas unsealed letters have a tendency to get jammed in the Post offices High Speed he were in much better shape than last Holting we have succeeded in flattening out the Christmas the Post office also is receiving additional Revenue this month from an unexpected increase in mail to Holting these Are mostly packages containing food stuffs and other he it is still not too late to get Christ Mas cards in the Holting the deadline for cards to destinations in Canada is while local mail must be posted by next sealed Christmas cards can carry a 15cent Holting but if the reduced postage is postal regulations require that no More than five written words be on the special Green labels Are Avail Able from the Post office marked coded and which will Speed Christmas mail to its Holting number of cases represents an in what is being called an in creased incidence of Ompha locales May be an upswing in reporting the de Pape said the anomaly has prompted several suggestions some quite farfetched about its one possibility links hex Chloro a chemical to the a swedish study showed that nurses who washed their hands with the chemical compound from 50 to 60 times a Day had a higher incidence of babies with another individual blamed certain shoes made of plastic and crushed according to this foot perspiration reacts with the shoe creating a chemical which soaks into the skin and causes the others pointed the Finger at Bay the insecticide used by the City and province to Spray for encephalitis carrying mosque cps last but that Doest seem to be de Pape Manitoba exposure was too late to account for the birth consultant extols Al cans Benefit to City by Tom Goldstein Winni Eggers will receive As much As million annually and no pollution if Alcan builds its proposed smelter near City officials were told Cam a Winnipeg consultant conducting a study on the smelters socioeconomic Impact for the Compa told executive policy committee that Alcan would spend Between million and million a year in the City on contracts and other work if the Plant is the figure does not include More than million Alcan and its employees would spend in Winnipeg during the five years of Osier the projected spending figures Are among the Early findings of Osier Alcan also has commissioned an environmental Impact assessment and both studies will be submitted to the provincial government before Public hearings on the Likely next the company is not expected to make a final decision until next sum Mer on whether to locate the lion smelter on a site 40 Kilometres North of Osier said Between and Winni Eggers would provide labor Dur ing while another 600 to would hold administration related positions during that jobs envisioned of the roughly permanent jobs to be created directly and indirectly by the smelters Between 300 and 500 would go to he executive policy committee Mem Bers also were assured the City would suffer no pollution from the proposed there will be no Adverse effects on the environment off our said Serge the company Mani Toba manager of environmental Stu company officials and consultants said the planned use of state theart equipment would clean up almost All of the pollutants before they Are emitted into the its not a dirty not a Plant which is belching out fumes and said George a consultant conducting the environmental Impact study for he added that there is no factual basis for the concern that northwesterly winds would blow pollutants into few executive policy committee members had questions for the Alcan amnesty fighting Uphill Battle for rights Winnipeg member says publicity groups chief weapon in fighting repression delegation after its 55minute presen there is no question in my mind that the building of the smelter would be of great Benefit to the City of mayor Bill Norrie but Norrie wondered if the project would actually proceed Given the opposing positions of Alcan and the new nip government on Par ownership of a Hydro Plant for the Alcan wants the share to ensure its Power Supply and has offered to con tribute about half the estimated Cost of constructing the Lime Stone generating station on the Nelson give up smelter Premier Howard Pawley has said his government would give up the smelter rather than have Alcan own part of a generating Jacques Al cans Manitoba director of told City officials yesterday that company officials have yet to meet with the new provincial government and talks Are not Likely to be held until Early next but Bougie said he is confident an agreement can be Scarlet fever increase noted in Core schools intercity schools have reported an increase in the number of children with Scarlet fever this says a City health department Deputy medical health officer Doug Luckhurst said there have been 10 cases of Scarlet fever in intercity schools since one Case was reported in a West end school last Morley the provincial governments medical health officer for the Winnipeg said he has not noticed an increase in Scarlet fever in suburban the province does not require Doc tors to report incidents of the Mirrett noted Scarlet fever is not the ongoing concern it was decades Luckhurst said the increase Likely is due to a change in the organism which causes the Strep Throat like Dis Scarlet fever is Droplet or food borne and is marked by sore vomiting and a Strawberg Vyred the disorder usually is seen in children at the Onset of cold weather and is treated by it runs its course in about a by Paul Moloney amnesty internationals 20yearfight for human rights is still an Uphill the groups Canadian chairman said the level of Observance of human rights has not improved in the last Harry Schachter told a press conference in Winni As to whether we can realistically Hope to make a in the Long in in the Short in not David a Winnipeg lawyer and am Nesty said publicity is one of the groups most valuable weapons against re pression because countries which torture and execute citizens do not want their activities to become what amnesty does is give no country wants it known that it has a bad human rights the very publication of human rights violations is a Means of having them Matas the group estimates the government in Iran has executed citizens since 1979 and at least up to argentinians and guatemalans have disappeared in the last 15 in anywhere from to people disappeared Between 1969 and 1979 and the figure for Kampuchea is perhaps Schacter said amnesty which operates As a nonpolitical has documented and is seeking the release of about political prisoners around the but this activity is limited by availability of waging Campaign the with members in More than 100 is waging a Campaign against governments which cause disappearances be cause this is a particularly sinister form of re Matas he said quotation Marks Are used because the victims really have not disappeared it is just that the authorities deny holding them and claim to know nothing about their whereabouts or Fate despite evidence to the con Francisco chief of police in under the democratic govern ment of Salvador told reporters he was a victim of the disappearance tech Nique after the military regime of Augusto Pinochet overthrew Allende in he said he was fortunate in that his relatives were Able to track him Down after three and he was subsequently expelled from More captives disappear and its a More drastic he Matas said the technique was used by the nazis during the second world War and it has been on the upsurge since the chilean military for release of such captives Are invariably with the result that families Are left without even the Solace of in permanent am Nesty said in a statement released yester sometimes a released prisoner reports having seen one of the disappeared alive in but for most families this is followed by More years of anxious the relatives in Many cases Are the real targets of the governments to the extent that the motive of a disappearance May be the punishment or intimidation of other family amnesty another reason affects not Only the Digap peared1 and their families and but everybody in any country where disappear Ance has become routine the intimidation of the whole the which said one Way to attack the problem is to Send letters of concern to governments which cause yesterday highlighted four such cases d Carlos Humberto Contreras miss ing since when he was seen being captured and beaten by four men believed to be chilean secret the government denies he was arrested and the chilean supreme court rejected evidence to this effect and overturned a lower court order for his release d Kuba Kodya a critic of the government of Zaire who apparently was arrested for weapons has been missing since he was removed from his jail cell in 1979 indonesian troops o David Ximenes was running a car rental and taxi service when he was arrested by indonesian troops in Ximenes is believed to be imprisoned on the Island of Auturo off the Mainland of Tewfiq Drak who had studied neurology in Montreal and later opened a medical clinic in was summoned to the prison there and a week on june was transferred to an unknown Destina prison officials in horns have said they dont know where he Matas no country wants it known t ;