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CNN STUDENT NEWS For August 6, 2002

Aired August 06, 2002 - 04:00   ET

THIS IS A RUSH TRANSCRIPT. THIS COPY MAY NOT BE IN ITS FINAL FORM AND MAY BE UPDATED.

THIS IS A RUSH TRANSCRIPT. THIS COPY MAY NOT BE IN ITS FINAL FORM AND MAY BE UPDATED.
ANNOUNCER: You're watching CNN STUDENT NEWS seen in schools around the world because learning never stops and neither does the news.

SUSAN FREIDMAN, CO-HOST: We highlight health in CNN STUDENT NEWS today. We'll examine a phenomenon threatening fish and another causing symptoms in people.

SHELLEY WALCOTT, CO-HOST: From something fishy to the beach itself, grab a towel, it's time to hit the sand. But before we do, we'll "Focus" on pollution problems with a beach expert.

FREIDMAN: Pollution issues pervade our "Health Report" as well. Check out the quality of the air you're breathing.

WALCOTT: And a triathlon trio. We'll follow the fitness challenge of three brothers.

Welcome, I'm Shelley Walcott.

FREIDMAN: And I'm Susan Freidman. Thanks for joining us.

Topping today's show, a warning about a popular food item.

WALCOTT: The U.S. Agriculture Department is recalling over 2,000 pounds of chicken salad. It says the meat may be tainted with Listeria, a potentially fatal bacterium. Symptoms of Listeria poisoning include high fever, severe headache, neck stiffness and nausea. Listeria can also cause miscarriages, still births and fatal infection. The recalled salad was produced by Reser's Fine Foods on July 12. It was distributed to retailers in Alabama, Florida, Georgia, Kentucky and North Carolina.

There is also concern today about a deadly organism that's killed millions of fish in Chesapeake Bay and North Carolina. Fishermen also suspected it was making them sick.

Ann Kellan has the latest.

(BEGIN VIDEOTAPE)

ANN KELLAN, CNN SCIENCE CORRESPONDENT (voice-over): Hard to forget these (UNINTELLIGIBLE) and the hundreds of millions of fish killed in North Carolina and Maryland during the 90's. At the time, scientists said peristeria; a microscopic organism was to blame, that it released a poison into the water, killing fish. Even some people working around the waters suffered symptoms.

UNIDENTIFIED VIRUS VICTIM: At first, I developed some sores on me. I really didn't think nothing of it. Finally, it took for me to go to my own doctor and I dropped in his office.

KELLAN (on-camera): Five years after the last major outbreak and scientists are still deeply divided about how peristeria kills. Two studies just realized, one in the journal, "Nature," the other in the proceedings of the National Academy of Science has claimed that peristeria based studies did not kill by poisoning fish, but physically attacking them.

WOLFGANG VOGELBEIN, VIRGINIA INSTITUTE OF MARINE SCIENCE: The organism has this intensive swarming response where it is attracted to the fish, actively swims towards the fish. It attaches to the skin by a little structure called a peduncle and then, it actively feeds on the skin. And in a very short order, it can denude a fish completely of the skin.

UNIDENTIFIED MALE: We set out to find the toxin and we didn't expect to conclude that there wasn't one.

KELLAN (voice-over): The issue has polarized scientists. Joanne Burkholder is a pioneer of peristeria research. She agrees that peristeria can physically kill, but says there is a more deadly strain out there that can poison too.

JOANNE BURKHOLDER, N.C. STATE UNIVERSITY: These two laboratories were using benign strains. They used the wrong strains of peristeria not the toxic strains.

KELLAN: They do agree this one-celled organism, the so-called, cell from hell, is a killer that's been lying low lately. Whether or not scientists can control it when it reemerges depends on understanding how it kills.

Ann Kellan, CNN, Atlanta.

(END VIDEOTAPE)

FREIDMAN: Japanese officials are cracking down on the sale of Chinese-made diet pills. Government officials say the diet products caused the death of 4 people and sickened about 300. A Health Ministry list now includes 17 diet pills that have proven harmful to consumers there and elsewhere.

CNN's Rebecca MacKinnon reports on a sometimes lethal quest to be thin.

(BEGIN VIDEOTAPE)

REBECCA MACKINNON, CNN CORRESPONDENT (voice-over): This woman says she's ashamed she could have killed herself trying to lose weight. After one week of taking this Chinese diet medicine bought over the Internet, she found herself paralyzed with pain. Her entire digestive system had shut down.

UNIDENTIFIED FEMALE (through translator): This medicine is very popular because you can lose weight without exercising and you can eat as much as you want. The label didn't say anything about side effects.

MACKINNON: In fact, her pills and several other brands of Chinese diet medicine sold through the Internet claim to contain only herbal ingredients. That claim was false.

(on camera): This is one of several Chinese-made diet medicines that have killed four people here in Japan and made hundreds others seriously ill. They all contained the substance Fenfluramini, which was banned in the United States in 1997 after it was found to cause damage to heart valves.

(voice-over): For the very brave, undisguised Chinese-made Fenfluramini can also be found on the Internet. Doctors here blame naive consumers and legal loopholes.

DR. KANJI WAKABAYASHI, PHYSICIAN (through translator): Individual imports the medicine for personal use, it's not illegal. There needs to be better regulation and a better public information.

MACKINNON: But it's also a problem of social pressure. Television, magazines and billboards constantly bombard women to the very thin standard of feminine beauty.

Legal diet products from all over the world remain a hot growth market in Japan. Young women like these say they still take diet pills despite the recent scare.

She says she's more afraid of getting fat. It doesn't look cool.

But another ashamed victim of the Chinese diet pills says she learned her lesson the hard way when she nearly died of liver malfunction.

The question is, how many more women out there are literally dying to be thin?

Rebecca MacKinnon, CNN, Tokyo.

(END VIDEOTAPE)

WALCOTT: Well the beach is where many Americans will spend the last full month of summer. Coastal tourism is the fastest growing industry in the world. In the United States, 90 percent of all tourist dollars are spent in coastal states. The popularity of the shore, however, raises some concerns about cleanliness.

CNN's Judy Woodruff addressed that issue with a beach expert.

(BEGIN VIDEOTAPE)

JUDY WOODRUFF, CNN ANCHOR: With me now is someone who has been to over 650 of America's beaches. Known as "Dr. Beach," Dr. Stephen Leatherman has made a career of studying America's coastal areas. Every year he puts out a study and names America's top 10 healthy beaches.

Dr. Leatherman, millions of Americans going to the beach this summer but not every beach is as healthy as the next one.

DR. STEPHEN LEATHERMAN, "DR. BEACH": Well that's true. I mean it depends on what you're looking for, but if you're going to some of the beaches, lots of crowds these days.

WOODRUFF: Crowds and development.

LEATHERMAN: And development. It seems like we have a -- Americans have a love affair of beaches. In the last couple of decades, everybody wants to live on a shore and everybody wants to be there so that's what happens to some of the areas. Ocean City, Maryland gets 400,000 people on a big weekend. That's a lot of people on a -- on 10 miles of beach.

WOODRUFF: Let's talk about some of the manmade factors that are threatening America's beaches. What about over development, just how big a problem is that?

LEATHERMAN: Well development is what you need to accommodate all of the people trying to get to the beach. But on the other hand, we're crowding out nature in some areas. There's no nature left. Some cases sand dunes are gone. So it is a problem. It is a real concern. And certainly in my survey if there's too much development and too many people, it certainly lowers the rankings then of those -- of those beaches.

WOODRUFF: Are there -- are there beaches -- are there parts of the country where development is worse than others or is it everywhere?

LEATHERMAN: It's really starting to be everywhere. I mean we talk about the forgotten coast, which is the Gulf Coast, but even there in the Florida Panhandle that area is now starting to be discovered, shall we say. Still a lot of undeveloped beaches, I should say, in that area, but -- and of course we do have the state parks, we do have the natural seashores which are real treasures. Those areas will be locked away forever from development, but certainly we're seeing a huge urbanization along our America's coastline.

WOODRUFF: With development necessarily comes pollution or is that not the case?

LEATHERMAN: Well certainly when you have a lot of people at the shore, there are people who leave things on the beach. There's a problem of some cases of sewer overflows and that sort of thing. But I should -- and we do have problems there, make no mistake, but we're working very hard to clean up areas and the news is -- the good news is we're making things better. We kind of reached a low ebb I'd say about 10, 20 years ago. Remember all the hypodermic needles washing up on the beeches? That was a low ebb. Things are better, but we have a long way to go. And certainly more people does mean more trash on the beach and in some cases a little more pollution.

WOODRUFF: So what is your message to people as they think about either visiting a beach or trying to buy a place on the coast somewhere, what do you say to them?

LEATHERMAN: I say you know look at the quality of the beach, look at how wide the beach is, whether or not it has an erosion problem or not. Some beaches are eroding and next thing you know you won't have a beach. Also look at the water quality. And in fact, we started a program to certify beaches called a Healthy Beaches Campaign and starting to look at beaches in that -- those criteria to let people know where are the good beaches -- the good quality beaches. So after all, not every beach can be in my top 10 list, but there's still hundreds and hundreds of great beaches in America.

WOODRUFF: And what about people's responsibility to keep these beaches clean?

LEATHERMAN: Well that's absolutely right. We have to do everything we can. You know only leave your footprints behind. Pick up what you bring to the beach. Beaches are not big ashcans to leave your cigarettes or coke bottles or beer cans or whatever -- big, big problem.

Boaters the same thing. People throw things over the boat, think the ocean's a, you know, sort of an endless garbage can or something. It's not. So we have to respect our beach. We have to respect our coastline.

And other things you can do is think about the level of development and maybe if you live there maybe you ought to talk to the leaders of the town and say gee, enough is enough.

WOODRUFF: All right, Dr. Stephen Leatherman, known famously as "Dr. Beach," we thank you so much for talking to us.

LEATHERMAN: Thank you, Judy, glad to be with you.

WOODRUFF: Appreciate it.

(END VIDEOTAPE)

WALCOTT: We'll take an in depth look at the state of America's shores next week in a special report on beach quality. Find out if you could be swimming in sewage. Plus, tips on how to stay safe and avoid contamination. That's coming next Monday and Tuesday right here on CNN STUDENT NEWS. And later in today's show, how clean is the air you breathe?

FREIDMAN: We continue our weeklong ride through the car culture and economy as we turn to American highways and byways. Next year's federal budget will trim spending on the nation's roads. Cuts could be nearly $9 billion. Critics say that's the path to more traffic congestion, road hazards and significant damage to the economy.

We travel to the capital of congestion now for a look at the economics of road repair.

(BEGIN VIDEOTAPE)

CASEY WIAN, CNN CORRESPONDENT (voice-over): Warren Kleinendorst (ph) drives his truck about 140,000 miles a year, often on congested roads.

WARREN KLEINENDORST (PH), TRUCKER: Can't make any money that way. The margin's too slim to start with.

WIAN: The Texas Transportation Institute estimates traffic congestion drains $78 billion annually out of the nation's economy.

MIKE TOOHEY, AMERICAN HIGHWAY USERS ALLIANCE: Today our society chooses to allocate public resources to social programs as opposed to investments in infrastructure, which provide long-term return, but which have tremendous payoffs for our economy.

WIAN: The worst place is Los Angeles, where 87 percent of residents drive to work and the average commuter wastes eight work days a year stuck in traffic. Expanding this one freeway intersection would yield savings of nearly $6 billion in time, fuel and pollution, according to the American Highway Users Alliance.

But big highway projects often spin out of control. Boston's $15 billion big dig is $5 billion over budget and months behind schedule.

KEVIN MCCARTY, SURFACE TRANSPORTATION POLICY PROJECT: There are many things that we can do to really extract more performance out of the investments the taxpayers have already made, before we simply go out and rally behind major new road investments which, increasingly, are more costly and, in themselves, produce more delays in traffic, and never really seem to relieve the problem.

WIAN: Nationwide, nearly a quarter of U.S. roads are rated rough by the Federal Highway Administration. In California about 1/3 need repair.

JEFF MORALES, CALTRANS: We're making massive investments in maintaining the system. That's critical. Right now out of the governor's budget this year, one out of every five miles of state highway will be under improvement this year.

WIAN: But money is becoming scarce. Federal funds are linked to economic growth, so next year's budget slashes highway money by 27 percent.

(on camera): Every billion dollars spent on highway projects creates an estimated 40,000 jobs. So Congress is considering a proposal that would restore about half of the planned federal highway fund cuts. A decision is expected by fall. Casey Wian, CNN Financial News, Los Angeles.

(END VIDEOTAPE)

ANNOUNCER: Exploring our world, here now is CNN STUDENT NEWS "Perspectives."

WALCOTT: The smell of burnt rubber and the squeal of spinning tires, car races are all the rage among Russian teenagers. Problem is, many of these races are taking place on the streets rather than the track and that has authorities concerned.

CNN's Chris Welock (ph) takes a look at this newfound and illegal craze.

(BEGIN VIDEOTAPE)

CHRIS WELOCK, CNN CORRESPONDENT (voice-over): The proverbial Russian passion for speed is taking a dangerous new spin. Ready, set, go.

Hundreds of teenagers and young adults are catching the fever of streetcar racing, illegal events that are becoming more and more popular in major cities across Russia.

UNIDENTIFIED FEMALE (through translator): This is a rush. You know it is what we don't get enough of in our daily life. We get caught up in the regular grind and we need this thrill, this adrenaline.

WELOCK: The races are well organized with their own Web sites and a network of contacts. But it's through the old fashioned word of mouth that the times and dates of the races are spread.

In a typical night, dozens of pairs of cars will square off with imports and domestic models all gunning for glory.

UNIDENTIFIED MALE (through translator): All sorts of cars come here from Russian segalies (ph) to the latest types of Nissan Skylines with horsepower up to 1,000. The major attraction of this event is that anyone can take part in the race.

WELOCK: The cars race at speeds up to 200 kilometers or about 120 miles per hour with onlookers standing just a hair off the road. The track may be a highway or a city street along bus routes. The races have become a concern for Russian police. But the popularity of these illegal events forces them to take a hands-off approach. Cruising slowly through the crowd of excited spectators, the policemen have only this warning.

"Drivers, please do not race onto the city limits. Stay here and crash yourselves."

It's a warning that, for the time being at least, is being left in a cloud of smoke.

Chris Welock, CNN. (END VIDEOTAPE)

WALCOTT: Stay with us, coming up, our Student Bureau looks at street racing in America and a safer alternative.

FREIDMAN: The quality of the air we breathe can have a huge impact on the health of our lungs. The American Lung Association recently issued its annual "State of the Air" report. The group looked at government data on ozone, smog's main ingredient.

What it found is a bit alarming as CNN's Natalie Pawelski reports.

(BEGIN VIDEOTAPE)

NATALIE PAWELSKI, CNN ENVIRONMENT CORRESPONDENT (voice-over): From coast to smoggy coast, half of all Americans are living dangerously in places where air pollution levels, the report says, can be hazardous to your health.

JOHN KIRKWOOD, PRESIDENT & CEO, AMERICAN LUNG ASSOCIATION: There actually has been an increase of about 18 percent in the areas that are rated an F, which is unhealthy.

PAWELSKI: For the third year in a row, the four smoggiest cities are in California: L.A., Bakersfield, Fresno and Visalia. Houston, Texas came in fifth. Atlanta ranked sixth, followed by Merced, California Knoxville, Tennessee, Charlotte, North Carolina and Sacramento.

All of these cities scored Fs for ground level ozone. Note most on the list are hot and sunny. Start with the pollution most cities have. Nitrogen oxides and hydrocarbons from tail pipe emissions and smoke stack pollution, mix in the heat and the sunlight, and you get ozone. That's the main ingredient in smog.

Ozone is especially dangerous for people with asthma, children and the elderly.

KIRKWOOD: Because ozone is an irritant. It is like getting a sunburn on your airways, and that affects everyone.

PAWELSKI: But some Americans are breathing relatively freely in cities that earned an A, suffering no smog alerts from 1998 through 2000. That list includes Bellingham, Washington, Colorado Springs, Colorado, Duluth, Minnesota, Fargo, North Dakota and Flagstaff, Arizona. Also on that clean list, Honolulu, Laredo, Texas, Lincoln, Nebraska, McAllen, Texas, Salinas, California and Spokane, Washington.

Some of these cities are relatively low smog, because of climate or geography. Others have less traffic or fewer industrial sources of pollution.

KIRKWOOD: You can't do anything about the weather and topography. What you have you to address are the sources of hydrocarbon and nitrogen oxide emissions. PAWELSKI: Cleaning up the sources of that pollution from the plants that power homes and businesses to the tailpipes on America's increasingly crowded roads will not be easy.

(on camera): Case in point, right here in Atlanta, one of the sprawl capitals of the universe, and Atlantans drive more miles than almost any other Americans. All of that traffic means a lot of pollution, and our climate, which is usually pretty hot and sunny, that can gets baked into a lot of smog. And efforts to get Atlantans out of their cars and into mass transit and into car pools haven't made much of a dent, one example of one city of what cities across the country are trying to do to battle the smog problems.

Natalie Pawelski, CNN, Atlanta.

(END VIDEOTAPE)

WALCOTT: It is a growing and very dangerous trend among American teens. It is streetcar racing, a phenomenon picking up speed across the country.

Our Student Bureau recently hit the pavement to uncover the risks of life in the fast lane and to discover a solution.

(BEGIN VIDEOTAPE)

UNIDENTIFIED MALE (voice-over): A late night, a lonely road, the perfect conditions for street racing. This scene is becoming increasingly common in cities and towns across the nation.

"GRANT," TEEN RACER: I have probably been racing for about a year and a half or two. I have never been arrested or caught. And I do it for the adrenaline.

UNIDENTIFIED MALE: Racers like these are a growing breed among America's teenagers. This is due in part to the low cost of compact sports cars and the abundance of after market parts for them. It has come to the point where some new solution to this growing problem is needed.

UNIDENTIFIED MALE: A lot of the times when kids are all just met up in one area and just showing off their cars and not (ph) innocent, cops come and break it up which is when the races actually do start.

UNIDENTIFIED MALE: Due to the illegal and inherently dangerous nature of street racing, it receives much negative attention. However, this bad reputation is also given to the people who are legally involved in showing their cars and sanctioned drag racing.

JONATHAN NEMBHARD, RACING ENTHUSIAST: Don't get it twisted like Braiz (ph). This ain't "Fast and Furious" you know. This is a love. This is -- this is a scene, you know. You know we don't go out there racing, trying to, you know, take people's pink slips or hijack, you know, freighter trucks. You know we do this for the love of the sport. We do this because we like this, you know. A lot of these cars here, this is hard-earned stuff people work for to get. MIKE BALOG, RACING ENTHUSIAST: The street racing thing right now, I mean the cops are really strict about, you know, getting on everybody for street racing I mean. They're trying to legalize it kind of sort of, but it doesn't seem to be working. So I don't know what the risk (ph) you're looking at it towards now, but I mean if -- I mean you got Bithlo to go race at so right now (UNINTELLIGIBLE) place to go.

UNIDENTIFIED MALE: Local drag strips like this one in Bithlo, Florida are helping to quell the problem of street racing, providing a safe, controlled and legal racing environment.

UNIDENTIFIED MALE: I guess if you're going to be doing street racing you might as well come and do it here to be safe and don't hit anybody (UNINTELLIGIBLE).

"GRANT": Yes, I go out to Bithlo about once a month, maybe twice, and I try to race out there. It's just as fun, but I think it would be way too hard to completely get rid of it because I mean two cars at a stop light, if they want to go, as long as no cops, they'll go.

UNIDENTIFIED MALE: Blake Taylor, CNN Student Bureau, Orlando, Florida.

(END VIDEOTAPE)

"Where in the World" site of the 1980 Winter Olympics, located in the Adirondack Mountains, host to a summer theater and a music festival? Can you name this place? Lake Placid, New York, U.S.A.

WALCOTT: Lake Placid, New York is the destination for our next report, the saga of three brothers.

FREIDMAN: Except these guys aren't only family, they're also triathlon competitors.

WALCOTT: That's right. CNN medical correspondent, Dr. Sanjay Gupta, follows three men from the same family as they train and compete in an Ironman contest.

(BEGIN VIDEOTAPE)

DR. SANJAY GUPTA, CNN CORRESPONDENT (voice-over): The challenge -- a 2.4 mile swim, followed by a 112 mile bike ride, topped off by running a full marathon, 26.2 miles.

JORDAN METZL, IRONMAN COMPETITOR: It's just the hardest endurance event you can do. It really tests your entire mind, your body, every faculty you have.

GUPTA: The challengers? The Metzl brothers -- Jordan, Jamie and Josh.

KURT METZL, FATHER: Jordan is a sports medicine doctor in New York. Jamie is in Washington, D.C. He works for the Senate Foreign Relations Committee. Josh is getting ready to start medical school.

JORDAN METZL: We definitely grew up in a Type A Kansas City family, so, on the more aggressive side of things. But we were always encouraged to do, you know, everything we wanted to do. There was never a goal that was too high or too crazy.

GUPTA: Crazy, a word many use to describe the Ironman.

KURT METZL: Well, I think the Ironman everybody thinks is kind of crazy. Why would anybody do that to themselves for 12, 13 hours straight?

JOSH METZL, IRONMAN COMPETITOR: 140.6 miles is a really long way, even when you drive it, even when you fly it.

GUPTA: A successful family by any standard. Experts say the Metzls are just the type to seek this challenge. And now, they are challenging each other.

JAMIE METZL, IRONMAN COMPETITOR: We have a friendly sibling rivalry, which I think inspires us and pushes us. But at the end of the day, we're all really rooting for each other.

GUPTA: For the Metzls, the Lake Placid Ironman is just another goal.

MARILYN METZL, MOTHER: I knew it wouldn't be long before they took another challenge for themselves.

GUPTA: Living in three different cities, they've each developed their own training regimen.

JAMIE METZL: I swam a lot, I biked a lot and I ran a lot.

GUPTA: Jordan takes a less stringent approach, workouts and classes at a Manhattan gym. He says he's doing the best he can. Josh, a more competitive approach, participating in smaller triathlons. His brothers say he has the upper hand, with no job and fewer responsibilities. They say this is something they are doing together.

JAMIE METZL: It's a group effort. We're competing alongside each other. But if, as we compete alongside each other, somebody does better than the other body -- than the other, then we'll be able to tease the other guys for at least a year.

GUPTA: And who will get the bragging rights?

JAMIE METZL: Josh is, in many ways, meant to beat this year. I hope that I'm first, Josh is second and Jordan, Jordan is third.

JOSH METZL: Jordan will come in last. Hopefully I'll win.

JORDAN METZL: My money is on Josh. But we'll see. I hope he beats Jamie. If I can't beat him, I want Josh to beat him.

GUPTA: But for this family, it's really about the camaraderie and the challenge.

JORDAN METZL: The biggest worry about this whole thing is getting to a point and not being able to finish. You put in a lot of effort and it just takes so much time and mental preparation.

GUPTA: And finishing is what the Metzls thought about as they started the course that they had 17 hours to complete. They predicted they would conquer it in just 12 or 13. Over an hour after the start, it's out of the water and onto their bikes. Jamie is in the lead. He finishes the biking in just over six hours. Josh brings up the Metzl rear about 40 minutes later. It's now over seven hours since they began their grueling journey and the marathon still lies ahead. It's the last leg, with the end finally in sight.

The final times -- Jamie in first with a total time of 12 hours, 13 minutes and 53 seconds. Jordan is next with a time of 12 hours, 40 minutes and 48 seconds. And little brother Josh was welcomed to the finish line by his brothers at 12 hours, 58 minutes and 29 seconds.

JOSH METZL: I mean you can train all you want, but the race isn't about your body.

JAMIE METZL: I feel great. It's the hardest day. It's 12 and a half hours in pain.

GUPTA: And quite an inspiration for us all. Maybe I'll try it next year. And then again, maybe not.

Dr. Sanjay Gupta, CNN, Lake Placid, New York.

(END VIDEOTAPE)

FREIDMAN: Well that's a pretty healthy case of sibling rivalry.

WALCOTT: Yes, it certainly is, Susan. They really inspire each other to keep fit.

FREIDMAN: Yes. And congratulations to all three for staying the course.

WALCOTT: And now it's time for us to run. We're out of here.

FREIDMAN: We'll see you tomorrow. Bye-bye.

WALCOTT: Bye.

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