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This is SCIENCE IN THE NEWS, in VOA Special English. I'm BobDoughty.

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And I'm Sarah Long. Coming up thisweek: a report on efforts to reduce medical mistakes in Americanhospitals.

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Some new ways to kill mosquito eggs in water.

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And some underwater competition creates trouble for jewelrymakers in Hawaii.

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Five years ago, a study estimated the number of deaths each yearcaused by medical mistakes in hospitals in the United States. Theestimate was between forty-four thousand and ninety-eight thousand-- or one in every two hundred patients.

The Institute of Medicine, part of the National Academy ofSciences, did the study. The report was called "To Err Is Human."There was a lot of talk about the findings. Some experts called theestimates too high. Others called them too low.

The report called for changes designed to reduce the chance formistakes to happen in medical care. Not all mistakes are deadly. Thereport told of a man who was supposed to have his right leg removed.Doctors cut off the left one by mistake.

The report said this kind of medical error is not unusual. Itsaid many people are given the wrong medicine, or too much of theright medicine. New medicines with similar names are part of theproblem. For example, Celebrex, Cerebyx and Celexa are threedifferent medicines used to treat very different medical problems.

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The Institute of Medicine report said changes in hospitalpolicies could prevent many of these mistakes. Thenineteen-ninety-nine study called for another examination later thisyear to measure progress.

Health care experts say a number of reforms have yet to takeplace. But they say hospitals have made improvements. Some are verysimple. In fact, one of our friends here in the office discoveredone for himself. Ten years ago he had an operation on his left knee.The operation was a success. But when he went into the hospital, noone asked him to confirm which knee required the operation.

Recently, he had the same operation on his right knee. This time,a hospital worker asked him which knee was to be repaired. He wasasked to place his hand on that knee. Then he was given a pen. Hewas told to write "yes" on the right knee and "no" on the left one.

After that, he entered the operating room. The nurse and thedoctor both asked him which knee was the one to be fixed. Theywanted to make sure one last time that the right knee was the rightknee.

This month a group that inspects American hospitals ordered thatsimple safety measures like these be required before all operations.That group is called "Jayco" -- the Joint Commission forAccreditation of Healthcare Organizations.

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Another effort to reduce mistakes involves information sharingamong hospitals to improve the treatment of newborn babies. Eachhospital can search the collected information for the best way toperform an operation or treat different problems in babies. Safetyexperts say information sharing can not only reduce mistakes butalso improve the quality of medical care.

The Institute of Medicine report five years ago said mostmistakes are caused by communication failures. These includemistakes with medicines. There are efforts to increase the use ofcomputers in hospitals to avoid such mistakes. The goal is make surepatients get the correct medicines and in the correct amounts.

Traditionally, doctors have written their orders on paper. Thehandwriting can be difficult to read. But there is no such problemwhen the doctor enters the information into a computer instead.

The computer can also be used to avoid other mistakes. Forexample, it can warn if a medicine will form a dangerous combinationwith another drug already taken by the patient.

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Safety experts hope that health care providers will learn fromthe mistakes of others -- and not just other health care providers.

It is often said that doctors can learn from pilots. The flightindustry has done a lot of work to reduce mistakes. These effortsinclude training for pilots about the importance of teamwork. Butteamwork is not the only solution. Efforts are also made to changesystems where misunderstandings and mistakes are easily possible.

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This is Science in the News, in VOA Special English.

Mosquitoes spread malaria and other diseases that kill or sickenmillions of people a year, mostly in developing countries.Mosquitoes lay their eggs in water. These insects often lay theireggs in old tires or other places where rainwater has collected.This is why public health officials tell people not to leavestanding water on their property. But an American man has designedsome ways to use standing water to control mosquitoes.

Donald Hall of Virginia is a retired engineer. His inventionstarget mosquito eggs. One device pushes the water from a bird bathinto a filter. The filter crushes the eggs that have been laid inthe water. Some mosquitoes too young to fly are also killed.

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Another invention by Mister Hall is a special outdoor tray thatis filled with water. It serves as an inviting place for mosquitoesto lay their eggs. But the heat of the sun causes a coil device atthe bottom of the tray to expand during daylight hours. So the eggsrise to the surface of the water. There they become hot and die. Inthe evening, the metal coil shrinks back under water, so moremosquitoes can lay their eggs.

Donald Hall says devices like these would be simple and low costto make for developing countries. He recently received a UnitedStates patent to protect his ownership rights to his inventions. Wehave a link to his patent information on our Web site,voaspecialenglish-dot-com.

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Scientists in Hawaii say a beautiful but unwelcome form of oceanlife threatens the coral industry in that state. They say snowflakecoral is invading an area between the Hawaiian islands of Maui andLanai. It kills black coral by crowding it out in the competitionfor resources.

Coral is made up of colonies of small organisms called polyps.One end of a coral polyp has a mouth. The other end usually sticksto hard surfaces. The polyps of snowflake coral are white. So thecolonies look like fields of snow.

These polyps form shapes like trees as they grow. Right now, mostof the snowflake coral develops at depths as low as one-hundred-tenmeters. That is below the level that divers can easily reach.

Snowflake coral connects itself to shells and other objects thatlive on black coral. Hawaii's black coral is used to make jewelryand other objects. This industry is worth twenty-five to thirtymillion dollars to the state. Hawaiian coral rings, bracelets andnecklaces are especially popular.

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Sam Kahng is an ocean science researcher at the University ofHawaii. Last December, Mister Kahng did research with a submarineprovided by the Hawaii Undersea Research Laboratory.

In the area he studied, he noted the presence of snowflake coralin or around all the colonies of black coral. He saw areas of blackcoral that had been killed by the snowflake coral. He said a singlepolyp of coral can produce as many as one hundred eggs. It can growmore than a centimeter a week.

Mister Kahng said many new colonies of snowflake coral are juststarting to form. Snowflake coral grows much faster than blackcoral.

The invasive coral is not all bad. It does provides shelter forfish. Still, it competes with black coral and small fish for foodsupplies.

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Snowflake coral was first seen in Hawaii at Pearl Harbor innineteen-seventy two. Researchers say the coral polyps may havestuck to the bottoms of ships that sailed into Hawaiian waters fromthe Caribbean.

Several years ago, Sam Kahng explored the area between Maui andLanai with Richard Grigg from the University of Hawaii. Mister Griggis now partly retired. He says he does not think snowflake coralwill kill all the black coral beds. But he says it reduces the blackcoral that can be harvested for jewelry. He also says it may reducethe growth of new black coral by killing older beds. These olderbeds make it possible for black coral to reproduce.

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SCIENCE IN THE NEWS was written by Nancy Steinbach, Paul Thompsonand Jerilyn Watson. Cynthia Kirk was our producer. This is SarahLong.

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And this is Bob Doughty. Join us again next week for more newsabout science, in Special English, on the Voice of America.