Like outlet shoppers,
Gazans stream into Egypt
RAFAH, Gaza Strip - On foot, in cars and in donkey carts, tens of thousands of Gazans flooded into Egypt yesterday through a border fence blown up by militants - puncturing a gaping hole in Israel's airtight closure of the Gaza Strip.
Gazans cleared out stores in an Egyptian border town, buying up everything from TV sets to soft drinks, cigarettes and propane.
As waves of people swarmed through the destroyed barrier Egyptian security forces lined up on one side of the border and Hamas forces lined up on the other.
The breach seemed certain to strengthen Hamas in its showdown with Israel, the West and its Fatah rivals - relieving some of the pain of an international blockade of the Gaza Strip following Hamas' violent takeover of the coastal territory in June and the periodic rocketing of sites in Israel.
It also raised Israeli fears of an influx of weapons and militants to Gaza and threatened to undermine crucial Egyptian participation in a Mideast peace push by President Bush.
Doctors report breakthrough for organ-transplant patients
LOS ANGELES - In what's being called a major advance in organ transplants, doctors say they have developed a technique that could free many patients from having to take anti-rejection drugs for the rest of their lives.
The treatment involved weakening the patient's immune system, then giving the recipient bone marrow from the person who donated the organ. In one experiment, four of five kidney recipients were off immune-suppressing medicines up to five years later.
"There's reason to hope these patients will be off drugs for the rest of their lives," said Dr. David Sachs of Massachusetts General Hospital in Boston, who led the research published in today's New England Journal of Medicine.
Anti-rejection drugs raise the risk of cancer, kidney failure and many other problems. And they have unpleasant side effects such as excessive hair growth, bloating and tremors.
_ Another study reported in today's Journal, found that having to pay as little as $10 of a mammogram's cost leads many older women to skip the breast-cancer exam. Screening rates were more than 8 percent lower among Medicare users required to make a copayment, compared to those with full coverage, according to a study led by Dr. Amal Trivedi at Brown University.
Oxygen hood catches fire;
preemie critically burned
