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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. This week -- the World Health Organizationhas a plan to fight the increase in overweight people around theworld.

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Alcohol-based hand cleaners make life easier for some people, butothers worry about the fire risk.

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These stories, and more, coming up ...

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The World Health Organization ismoving forward with a proposal to fight obesity around the world.All one-hundred-ninety-two countries in the World Health Assemblyare expected to consider the plan in May.

The United States and other members of the W-H-O Executive Boardvoted last month to send the plan for final approval. However, theUnited States and some others also requested an extra month tocomment on the plan.

Tommy Thompson, the secretary of health and human services,attended the meeting in Geneva. Mister Thompson said more time wasneeded to make sure the guidelines contained what he called "morescientifically based evidence." Comments will be accepted until theend of February.

The W-H-O calls the plan a "Global Strategy on Diet, PhysicalActivity and Health." The proposal urges people to eat more fruitsand vegetables and less fat, sugar and salt. The plan also suggeststhat governments restrict food advertising, especially messagesaimed at children. And it suggests that governments use tax policiesand price supports to get people to eat healthier food.

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Last month a Bush administration official sent a letter to W-H-ODirector-General Lee Jong-wook to call for changes in the plan. Theadministration says the report is not based on "the best science."Also, it says the plan does not talk enough about the responsibilityof a person to exercise and eat right. The administration says itssupports dietary advice that centers on the idea that all foods canbe part of a healthy and balanced diet.

Non-government health groups argue that the ideas in the plan arebased on common sense. They say the food and sugar industries areinfluencing the position of the administration. Administrationofficials deny that charge. They note several projects to fightobesity in the United States. They also note the personal campaignby Secretary Thompson to lose weight.

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A group called the International Obesity Task Force estimatesthat one-thousand-million people around the world weigh too much.This includes more than twenty-million children under age five. Andit includes more than three-hundred-million people who are severelyoverweight. In the United States, about one-third of adults areconsidered obese.

The problem of obesity has also spread to developing countries.Health officials say poor diet and lack of exercise are among theleading causes of heart disease, type two diabetes and some cancers.They estimate that these kinds of diseases are now responsible foralmost sixty percent of deaths worldwide.

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Health officials say one of the most important ways people canstop the spread of infection is to wash their hands well and often.Most people use soap and water. But others increasingly use productsthat let them clean their hands without water. Such cleansers areespecially popular with medical workers. People in health care aresupposed to wash their hands before and after each patient.

One kind of product is made with alcohol. Alcohol kills germs.And researchers say it does not add to the problem of drug-resistantbacteria. They say soaps that contain antibacterial compounds may.

Health officials say effective alcohol-based cleansers are atleast sixty percent alcohol. That amount can go as high as ninetypercent depending on the maker.

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In the United States, officials at the Centers for DiseaseControl -- the C-D-C -- advise all health care centers to usealcohol-based products. They say studies show that these cleansersreduce the number of bacteria on hands better than soap and water.

VOICE ONE (CONT):The C-D-C says almost two-million patients inthe United States each year are believed to get infections while inhospitals. It says ninety-thousand of them die as a result. Theagency also notes the problem of infections in smaller healthcenters and long-term care places.

But no product is perfect. Alcohol burns easily. This can presenta serious fire risk. It can also present a conflict for hospitalsthat want to have containers of hand cleanser in busy areas. Fireprevention experts say hospitals should not place alcohol-basedproducts in hallways that lead outside the building. They saypassages should be as free of flammable materials as possible, sopeople can get out safely.

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People living with AIDS and the virus that causes it can facerejection in their community and their jobs. Experts have createdspecial programs to increase the acceptance of people with AIDS. Onegroup, called the Change Project, has developed teaching informationfor people at the local level fighting the disease. It is called a"Toolkit for Action."

The toolkit includes fifty-seven teaching exercises thatcommunity groups and educators can use to help improve people'sknowledge of the disease. The goal is to help people understand thestigma, or bad thoughts about AIDS, and work toward ending it.

For example, many activities involve group discussions and thesharing of ideas, fears and personal experiences. Other activitiesrequire people to present information or act out stories in front ofother people.

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There are activities that teach about caring for HIV-AIDSpatients in the family. Other activities teach about stigma faced bychildren. There are also exercises to teach people about sex,morality and dishonor.

The Change Project created the toolkit with the help of theAcademy for Educational Development and the United States Agency forInternational Development.

AIDS activists from more than fifty non-governmentalorganizations in Ethiopia, Tanzania and Zambia helped write theexercises. You can get the toolkit from the Change Project Web site.That address is changeproject-dot-o-r-g.

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The Kodak company plans to stop selling traditional film camerasin the United States, Canada and western Europe by the end of thisyear. Sales of cameras for use only one time will continue. Kodakwill also continue to sell its traditional thirty-five-millimeterfilm in those countries.

Kodak says it wants to increase its sales of reloadable filmcameras in developing markets. These include China, India, easternEurope and Latin America. A Kodak official said the company isexpanding efforts to sell film and cameras in these markets becauseof increasing demand there.

Kodak also announced that it will no longer produce cameras forthe Advanced Photo System. The company began to sell A-P-S camerasin nineteen-ninety-six. But these never became very popular. Kodakwill continue to make A-P-S film.

The announcements are the result of an increase in demand fordigital cameras. Last year, more than twelve-million digital cameraswere sold in the United States. Digital cameras record imageselectronically, without film. Most people then print the images outon a computer, or send them to other people by e-mail. Traditionalcameras depend on film and chemical processing.

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The decisions mark an important event in the history of EastmanKodak Company. George Eastman started the company in Rochester, NewYork, in eighteen-eighty. Eastman invented a way to make it easierto take pictures. He called his camera "Kodak" because it soundedgood to him. Eastman said he always liked the sound of the letter K.So he mixed it with other letters and made the word Kodak.

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SCIENCE IN THE NEWS was written by Jill Moss, Caty Weaver andGeorge Grow. Cynthia Kirk was our producer. This is Sarah Long.

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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.