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About The Battalion. (College Station, Tex.) 1893-current | View Entire Issue (Nov. 13, 1985)
Page 4/The Battalion/Wednesday, November 13,1985 Give someone a tan for Christmas! Buy someone you care about a gift certificate for 5 or 10 tanning sessions and get one FREE for yourself! TANU 104 Old College Main at Northgate Walk-ins are welcome. Call 846-9779 for an appointment. For The Holidays, A Gift Of Gold Gold Coin Jewelry mountings for all popular U. S. gold coins, Pandas, maple leaf and krugerrands. 404 University Dr. East College Station*846-8905 Next to Cenare's Cmti EXCHANGE 3202 A. Texas Bryan*779-7662 Across from Wal-Mart 1 in a series Plan ahead for lowest fares, says A&M Travel Service experts. We’ve become the largest travel agency in this area by helping travelers find the best possible schedule at the lowest possible fare. We continue to believe that competition is the best method of cost contain ment. But there are a few new things in the travel in dustry that will help you save money — wherever you go to arrange your travel. Plan ahead: the lowest fares are for coach seats booked at least 30 days in advance. (A few carriers have a 14-day fare but 30 days or more is typical.) Call on us anytime you have questions about travel. We will help you get there for less. We welcome credit cards — particularly the American Express. A&M TVavel Service, Inc. Owned by Keith Langford ’39 (Houston) and Diane Stribling (President and Agency Manager) 701 University Drive East • College Station 846-8881 Waldo by Kevin Thom: Researcher concentrates studies on influenza treatment prevention By RODNEY RATHER Reporter Influenza vaccines exist that can prevent the flu, but most people do not take them, according to John Quarles, assistant professor of medi cal microbiology and immunology at Texas A&M. Because the flu is not a life-threat ening disease, people do not feel the need to protect themselves from it as they might against polio or dipthe- ria, Quarles says. For nearly 10 years, Quarles has been at A&M conducting research on how to prevent or cure viral in fections. This usually involves test ing vaccines. Jn the vaccine work, we’ve been involved primarily in testing a new type of influenza vaccine — the nose-drop kind — as compared to the kind you get as a shot in the arm, with the idea that it may be better or more acceptable to some people,” Quarles says. The vaccines are not tested at A&M until they have gone through several years of testing at the Na tional Institutes of Health. These governmental agencies help fund medical research, so the vaccines are considered safe and possibly useful before Quarles starts testing them on campus. He tries to determine if the vaccines are actually useful. “Our part of the question is ‘Do they worx? Do they work in the real world?”’ Quarles says. That question is answered in part by counting the number of A&M students who get the flu each year and having volunteers participate in flu studies. About 15 to 35 percent of A&M students get the flu each year, al though the statistics vary from year to year, Quarles says. As few as 15 to 18 percent of the students may get the flu in one year, while as many as 50 percent may get it in another year. These percentages closely re flect the percentage of people who get the flu in other areas, like Dallas and Houston, he says. The influenza outbreak at A&M usually starts in mid-January, imme diately after Christmas vacation, and lasts until spring break, Quarles says. The outbreak occurs at the begin ning of the spring semester because students return to school after inter acting with various people around the world, where they may come in contact with various types of dis eases. “Students leave and scatter out all over the world, so someoneista to pick something up and briri back,” he says. In the flu vaccine study, the unteer is given the serum in' usually October because the I needs about two months tol protection against the virus ! the volunteer waits to see if he tracts the disease. i thei npossi from being exposed to at least os the two or three major typesofi fluenza, which change consu from year to year, out coins sense is the best preventive medt in combating the flu, other than use of vaccines, Quarles says. “Try to eat and sleep decentlii not let people sneeze on you otis you or do things like that if tM; obviously infected," he says ak “College students are in kindi special situation. They can’t* rest as much as they should, don’t always eat properly and get a little run-down.’’ Currently, Quarles is prep for a study on the treatments fluenza to lie conducted in Jana and is not using students in hi< search. A&M profs visit to Sri Lanka fascinating, educational By JEAN MANSAVAGE Reporter When Dr. David Reed informed his Horticulture 201 class he would not be teaching the class for a month because he was going to Sri Lanka, his students chuckled. They figured that it was one of Reea’s light hearted gags. It wasn’t. Reed left Oct. 7 for the small is land country off the southern coast of India to teach a post-graduate course at the University of Perade- niya. He also evaluated the school’s research program and advised one of their graduate students. He re turned Oct. 31. Aside from his university busi ness, Reed says he learned more about tropical horticulture, his speci ality, during the visit. ‘oince my area of expertise is tropical horticulture, I was able to gain first-hand knowledge of what I’d been preaching,” he says. “It was an opening of awareness of my ex pertise.” Reed says he was fascinated by scenes of local culture such as the fire dancers who perform with torches pierced into their cheeks. i chipping away at huge boul- dth chisels for days to make Men ders with gravel and women working in rice E attics, cultivating the grain by and, illustrate the country’s heavy reliance upon manual labor, he says. One slide from the^ trip shows Reed in casual American dress — Izod shirt, jeans and boat shoes — atop an Asian elephant. This laid- back style is also typical of Reed at Texas A&M. He enjoys chiding his students about drinking Coke too early in the morning. They should drink coffee to get their caffeine, he says. Reed’s sense of humor comes through even in his class lecture supplement. His drawing of the nitrogen cycle of soil has a squirrel dying of a heart attack and decomposing to add or ganic material to the soil. The women in the class didn’t like when it was a hunter that led to the death of the little squirrel, so it is a heart attack that kills him, Reed says. Reed says students at A&M should experience the Asian culture. “Everbody should go once,” he says. “Sri Lanka is good exposure to Asian culture.” Sri Lanka is a poor country with a low standard of living, bulk hat famine and its people are highlj ucated, Reed says. Every pera met there could speak Sing! and English. Education is free to those qualify through the post-gradi level, Reed explains. Tnenumto students who qualify forthehfi levels is limited due to a seletti process of advancement. Because Reed taught at a hip level, he instructed those who« the cream of the cream of the® he says. euroi < (forn ou™ f: 401 f Rimsn K I? 97 TEXAS in the IIIItra liftin' ETUDE J ers’ S | allS APO-S' | DRL TAMU meet HISTO Nath 6 p.n • L m work 12 U TAUK AGGIE 5101 UNITE 1 > at 61 ' SULLY statu AMER] p.m. STUDI ij p.m AMER TIO : dext m HAGG MSCP stud Reed says the problem witha[« country having well-educated j! E le is that they leave Sri Lanb- etter paying jobs in other couniK Reed was displeased without! pect of Sri Lankan culture. “The lack of restrooms or v Americans would accept as sank facilities was memorable,” U comments. “I guess Americansr just too picky." profes Ken The professor says he think I ] experience was very worthwhile, ‘The trip was the most edits : nal experience of my life,”I says. Doctor defends use of weed killer as diet dm st ate, you ha constituencr g<> out in tl Associated Press HOUSTON — A Houston physi cian who the Texas attorney al’s office is suing defended the use of a weed killer in the diet clinics he owns, saying the chemical is effective in helping patients lose weight. The attorney general’s suit con tends the chemical 2-4 Dinitrophe- nol can cause serious side effects — including vomiting, high fever, headaches and abdominal pain, but Dr. Nicholas Bachynsky said “every drug has some side effects.” Bachynsky, who owns Physicians Clinics, said Dinitrophenol is effec tive in treating 90 percent'of the pa- Sevi tients with weight problems. “The question is not that i poison, but whether it’s taken in proper doses,” Bachynsky said. A I he attorney general’s offict j AUSTIN week sued Bachynsky, daiminf spill of abm use of the drug, whicn also is to 1 untreated v as Mitcal — in overweight pallet Creek in Ni toxic and has no medical value, suit in the #her water 1 st annual UNITED thorities. State off il on S the ci ucn the cr WAY BENEFIT BASH SAT. NOV. 16, 8 : 00 pm to TOO am CREEKSIDE PLAZA (next to Hilton MUSIC BY 11 ^_se«:ire* $i admission going to Brazos County United VM Live Remote KdRA K-BOB’S iPrints 1 Print Entry Prizei F< L SP< PEP^ 1