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http;//www.thepost.mindspring.com
THE VOICE OF THE BLACK COMMUNITY
THE WEEK OF OCTOBER 9, 1997
VOLUME 23 NO. 4
75 CENTS
ALSO SERVING CABARRUS, CHESTER, ROWAN AND YORK COUNTIES
Mosley-Braun
A
matter
of trust
Senator Mosley-
Braun criticizes
U.S. AIDS testing
By Chinta Strausberg
THE CHICAGO DEFENDER
U.S. Sen. Carol Moseley-
Braun (D-Ill.) is raking the fed
eral government over the coals
for continued U.S. funded med
ical experiments in the treat
ment of AIDS among poor
Third World women that she
said violated medical ethics.
The U.S. “hasn't learned its
lesson from the Tuskegee
Experiment in which penicillin
was denied to black men infect
ed with syphilis,” the senator
said.
Referring to an article in a
recent edition of The New
England Journal of Medicine
titled “The
Ethics of
Clinical
Research in
the ‘ Third
World,” the
senator
agreed that
withholding
the proven
AZT treat
ment from
pregnant
women with AIDS, violated
World Health Organization
guidelines intended to keep
researchers from conducting
unethical experiments. The
Helsinki Agreement and the
Nuremberg Code were interna
tional guidelines adopted after
World War II to prevent the
reoccurrence of experiments
similar to those carried out in
Nazi concentration camps.
The NEJM editorial states
that these international agree
ments mandate that, “Only
when there is no known effec
tive treatment is it ethical to
compare a potential new treat
ment with a placebo.
“When effective treatment
exists, a placebo may not be
used. Instead, subjects in the
control group of the study must
receive the best known treat
ment.”
Moseley-Braun credited the
health periodical for helping
“shine a spotlight on these
extremely questionable experi
ments. Unfortunately, the ethi
cal lessons we should have
learned from the Tuskegee
experiment may not have been
absorbed.”
The senator said that “AZT
has proven results in prevent
ing Mother-to-chiid transmis
sion of HIV.
“Despite that fact, groups of
women in the ongoing studies
are randomly selected to
receive placebos. As a result, at
least 1,000 children will suffer
and may die unnecessarily
from HIV,” Moseley-Braun
said.
“We must never allow
unknowing patients to be
abused as they were in the
Tuskegee scandal, and we must
not put people in harm’s way in
the name of science when
there’s clearly no rational
excuse to take such risks.”
Nonetheless, reports confirm
that the Clinton administra
tion is confident that the U.S.
funded experiments are ethical
and will save five to 10 million
See TESTING on page 7A
□ ■ □ '
New test for landmark busing decision?
PHOTO/PAUL WILLIAMS III
Seveal Charlotte groups, including the Black Political Caucus and League of Women Voters are expected to ask the federal courts
to reopen Swann v. Charlotte-Mecklenburg Board of Education, the landmark case that paved the way for busing as a tool for deseg
regating public schools. African American students have historically borne the brunt of busing.
Swann v. Board case may be reopened
By John Minter
THE CHARLOTTE POST
The federal courts will be
asked to reopen the landmark
Swann v. Charlotte-
Mecklenburg Board of
■Education lawsuit which
ordered busing to desegregate
local schools.
Several local groups, includ
ing the Black Political Caucus,
the Swarm Fellowship and the
League of Women Voters, have
asked the Ferguson, Stein law
firm to file the request in
response to a lawsuit filed last
month by a white southeast
Charlotte parent.
The Swann court papers are
expected to be filed today, with
a press conference scheduled in
the afternoon.
Ferguson, Stein associate
Anita Hodgkiss said she could
not discuss filing details except
to say her firm has been in con
tact with several people who
want to attach the Swann case
to a lawsuit filed by the father
of a white student.
That lawsuit, Capacchione v.
Charlotte-Mecklenburg
Schools, asks the federal courts
to stop local school officials
from using race as factor in
school assignments. William
Capacchione filed the lawsuit
after his daughter failed to win
a lottery seat at Olde
Providence Elementary, a com
munications magnet school.
The Charlotte-Mecklenburg
system maintains racial bal
ance at its magnet schools by
putting whites and blacks into
separate lotteries. The target
See SWANN on page 2A
Foundation helps community development
By John Minter
THE CHARLOTTE POST
PHOTO/PAUL WILLIAMS III
Enterprise Foundation President Rey Ramsey (middle) discusses
plans with Steve Washington and Nancy Berry.
Aid for Africa
The arrival of The Enterprise
Foundation in Charlotte last year
has given neighborhood redevel
opment efforts a much needed
boost.
The Columbia, Md.-based orga
nization’s local office is headed by
Steve Washington, a former
Charlotte neighborhood redevel
opment employee.
“I decided I could do more to
help the CDCs by working with
the foundation,” Washington said.
“I had been neighborhood devel
opment manager and worked on
economic development and hous
ing. I was the contact for the
CDCs.”
With the foundation’s help, a
$2.5 million grant pool has been
established to provide operating
and predevelopment capital for
neighborhood community devel
opment corporations, including
the Northwest Corridor CDC.
Six CDCs currently are eligible
for The Charlotte Neighborhood
Fund Nonprofit Capacity
Building Program. The program
is funded by The Enterprise
Foundation, Fannie Mae, the City
of Charlotte and local bank and
financial institutions
The CDCs can receive up to
three years of operating grants to
cover a decreasing percentage of
their total budgets. There is also a
$1 million loan fund for project
predevelopment costs.
Foundation president Rey
See ENTERPRISE on page 3A
By John Minter
THE CHARLOTTE POST
AfKcan children will get some
much needed school supplies and
clothing thanks to the efforts of
Wilbert Jones.
Jones, 33, has collected about
700 poimds of items and wants to
ship them next week to an
orphanage near Kumasi, Ghana,
and a self-help youth project in
Eldoret, Kenya.
He gathered the supplies from
donations, supplemented by his
own funds. Jones will take vaca
tion from his job with the U.S.
Customs office in Charlotte to
travel to AfHca with the supplies.
“I don’t want to do one project
and that’s it,” Jones said, “I would
like to mhke it a biannual kind of
event.”
Jones is a Statesville native and
father of two, was bom with a
genetic defect and must walk
vrith cmtches. But that doesn’t
deter him.
“Some people were surprised by
that,” he said of his .collection
effort. “But I say, ‘we are all
blessed and we don’t realize it.’ I
decided to be proactive. I want to
See AID on page 3A
Youth
focus on
Oct. 16
By Olive Vassell
NATIONAL NEWSPAPER
PUBLISHERS ASSOCIATEION
Black America’s youth will be
the focus of the 1997 Holy Day
of Atonement/Day of Absences,
Oct. 16.
Dr. Abdul Alim Muhammad,
national spokesman for Nation
of Islam leader Minister Louis
Farrakhan, said young people
are key to African American
survival.
“Our youth are so important
to our future,” he said. “We lit
erally have no future, except ai
it gets carried forward by the
younger generation and
this....generation that is vtitK
us now, is perhaps in some'
ways, paradoxically the most
gifted, but at the same time the
most endangered... Special
care and attention needs to be
paid to this new young genera^
tion to see to it that they have
the opportunity to move for
ward in time.”
Speaking of the Violent
deaths of prominent rap stars
Tupac Shakur and Notorious
B.I.G., Muhammad empha^
sized that using the eight steps
of atonement outlined )>>•
Minister Farrakhan at the
Million Man March, could have
saved them.
“We lost...since the last Holy
Day of Atonement both Tupac
Shakur and...Notorious B.I.G.,”
Muhammad said. “They were
gunned down in the kind of vio
lence that ends the lives of
many of our young men and
other young people....If Tupad
and those with him had put'
into practice the eight steps of
atonement, if Notorious B.I.G.
and those with him had under
stood the eight step process of
atonement, perhaps those two
great young stars would still be
alive.”
With events planned all over
the country to mark the second,
anniversary of the Million Man
March, many spearheaded by
local mosques and the Local-
Organizing Committees used
for the Million Man March, the
NOI is also encouraging com
munities to organize at a grass
roots level.
“During the observance this
year, we hope that there will bq
activities all over the country
that involve youth." Dr,
Muhammad said, adding that
See ACTIVITIES on page 3A
PHOTO/PAUL WILLIAMS II
Wilbert Jones and his son, Isasc Davis, prepare clothes for delivery
to children in Kumasi, Ghana and Eldoret, Kenya.
Inside
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