Guidelines

The financially-troubled JFK Memorial Hospital got a bit of good news yesterday when state Welfare Secretary John F. White announced that it will benefit from expanded state medical assistance guidelines. The new guidelines will extend coverage to more than 3,800 drug addicts and alcoholics who need to be hospitalized for detoxification and were not eligible under the former guidelines for in-patient care. White estimated that there are about 2,400 drug addicts and alcoholics in Philadelphia on waiting lists for hospitalization for detoxification - the physical withdrawal from substance abuse, which is the first stage of rehabilitation treatment.

If some students and parents think that homework is a thing of the past, the Medford Lakes school board has sent a message that it considers homework very much a part of the present. At a meeting March 17, the board adopted a policy that reaffirms for students, parents and teachers the value of homework. The policy requires that homework be given and sets rules for when it should be given, but it sets only guidelines, not rules, for how much should be assigned. "I think the policy is a good way to regulate what's happening in the schools," board member Ruth Ann Swannell said.

Police Commissioner Kevin M. Tucker denied yesterday that he was violating the civil rights of activist groups by conducting investigations into their activities, saying he was merely attempting to prevent problems at the bicentennial celebration of the Constitution. "This is not a police department running amok," Tucker said yesterday. "This is a police department with strict guidelines that I think are very responsible. We will conduct investigations if we think it is necessary.

In an advertisement, does a sale price that is hundreds of dollars below the original price shown mean a really big bargain? Not necessarily. Yesterday, Pennsylvania Attorney General LeRoy Zimmerman announced new advertising guidelines that he says will protect customers from being duped by retailers who make sale items look like bigger bargains than they really are. The guidelines, which govern the "original prices" featured in sale ads, require retailers to cite the everyday price of goods instead of original prices - which he contends are often inflated - in ads. Zimmerman vowed to prosecute retailers who violate the guidelines.

The Glassboro Board of Education last night released results of retesting of fourth graders on the Iowa Tests of Basic Skills. Many students who attended the third grade last year at the Academy School had low test scores when they took the test in April, prompting the retest, School Superintendent Nicholas A. Mitcho said. Of those students, 46 percent increased their scores between 16 and 64 percentile rankings in reading, and 51 percent improved between 16 and 77 rankings in mathematics.

The government has just made millions of us overweight - overnight. It has published a study that redefines the term, lowering the standards so that an estimated 29 million Americans who weren't overweight last week, now are. They have come up with a guideline they call "body mass index", which throws height and weight into a blender and comes up with a body fat figure. Don't ask how it's computed - it involves height in meters and weight in kilograms - but a BMI of 25 is considered fat. The government (naturally)

CHICAGO - Los Angeles Dodgers general manager Ned Colletti is operating under the same budgetary guidelines he had before Major League Baseball seized control of the team and said yesterday he reports to owner Frank McCourt until an administrator is appointed by Commissioner Bud Selig. Colletti talked with a league official Thursday but declined to identify the person. MLB spokesman Pat Courtney told the Associated Press that Colletti has been in contact with multiple people with the commissioner's office during the past couple of days, including Rob Manfred, baseball's executive vice president of labor relations.

IS THE CEREAL BOWL half empty - or half full? When it comes to a government proposal to pressure food companies to voluntarily change the way they market fast food, candy and sugary cereals to children, it's hard to say. A couple of weeks ago, an Interagency Working Group - including the Federal Trade Commission, the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention, the Food and Drug Administration and the U.S. Department of Agriculture - released proposed...

A graphic published Tuesday showing new Vitamin D guidelines gave incorrect units of measure. The Recommended Dietary Allowances and Upper Level Intakes listed the correct amounts but should have said they were in the form of International Units (IU). The Inquirer wants its news report to be fair and correct in every respect, and regrets when it is not. If you have a question or comment about news coverage, contact assistant managing editor David Sullivan (215-854-2357) at The Inquirer, Box 8263, Philadelphia 19101, or e-mail dsullivan@phillynews.

Tommy Thompson, secretary of health and human services, last week echoed what mothers have been preaching for years: "Eat your peas and get more exercise. " Unlike the popular diets that shun carbohydrates, new federal dietary guidelines, unveiled by Thompson, endorse multiple servings of fruits and vegetables and whole grains. They suggest up to 90 minutes of daily exercise. They slash salt, saturated fats and refined sugar. The goals sent some Americans reeling, but the serving sizes are achievable.