Adoption Inquiry Alarms Costa Rica
A suspected case of baby trafficking under investigation here and in Guatemala has shocked this country and drawn the attention of the U.S. Federal Bureau of Investigation.

The case of nine Guatemalan babies found when officials here raided a house run by a Coral Springs, Florida, adoption agency is the first of its kind in this Central American country and has been extensively covered by the media.

On Friday, Beverly Esselbach, a spokeswoman for the Federal Bureau of Investigation said: "We are looking into the matter." She declined to provide additional details.

The agency, International Adoption Resource, Inc., through its attorney, vehemently denies any allegations of baby smuggling or wrongdoing. The agency has not been charged by Costa Rica or U.S. officials. Florida's Department of Children & Families suspended the agency's license Dec. 5.

Earlier this week, the U.S. State Department Bureau of Consular Affairs posted an advisory on its Web site warning the public that IAR's license had been suspended, citing an Interpol warrant issued by a Costa Rican judge for Rolf Levy, the agency's international adoption coordinator, on suspicion of trafficking of minors.

Until recently, Costa Rica was spared the type of scandals that plagued other countries, such as Guatemala, where critics said lax laws resulted in that country exporting "more babies than coffee."

But this case has ignited fears here that Costa Rica, with its murky adoption laws, could acquire a reputation as a place where infants are placed in foreign homes with little oversight or government regulation.

It has also sparked a debate over conflicting laws that simultaneously allow for government and direct adoptions, but make it difficult to prosecute cases of suspected baby smuggling.

Costa Rica Tries to Halt Data Sales
Costa Rica's justice minister said lawmakers are likely to pass a measure by April restricting the sale of data that the government collects on its citizens.

The proposed legislation announced by Justice Minister Patricia Vega on Friday stems from a Costa Rican government study that determined that at least six companies operate in Costa Rica selling personal information, much of it credit-related, and some of it from government sources.

The study was prompted in large part by the public outcry that an Associated Press report on international data-trafficking triggered last April.

The AP reported that a U.S. company, ChoicePoint Inc., bought official registry files listing sensitive data on tens of millions of people from sources in Costa Rica, Mexico, Colombia, Venezuela, Nicaragua, Guatemala, Honduras and El Salvador.

The government data, obtained through middlemen, was sold by ChoicePoint to U.S. law enforcement, immigration and other agencies.

Vega said Friday that investigators believe that Guatemala-based Infor.net was the company that sold data to Atlanta-based ChoicePoint.

A commission appointed by President Abel Pacheco is still studying what safeguards are needed to protect the information government agencies collected on Costa Rica's citizens.

In July, the government ordered the Public Registry to stop selling information about property holdings.

"It's unbelievable that there is a right to extract data from public databases to create a private archive for commercial exploitation," Vega said. "That absence of laws puts the constitutional rights of Costa Ricans in danger."

In the wake of the AP story, ChoicePoint officials said they had stopped gathering data in some countries, including Costa Rica and Mexico.

HPV May Cause Oral Cancer
The sexually transmitted human papillomavirus, already shown to cause nearly all cases of cervical cancer, also may cause cancer of the mouth and oropharynx, the part of the throat including part of the tongue and the tonsils, Reuters Health reports.

Researchers in Costa Rica discovered HPV genetic material in about 4% of mouth cancer tumors and 18% of oropharynx tumors during a study of more than 1,400 oral cancer patients.

Almost all of the HPV DNA was shown to be from the HPV-16 strain of the virus, which is the viral strain also linked with cervical cancer development. HPV DNA was detected at a high frequency among cancer patients who said they regularly practiced unprotected oral sex, suggesting that bodily fluids shared during oral sex may expose mouth tissues to the STD and fuel the development of oral cancers.

The researchers say they hope HPV vaccines currently in development will be effective at preventing both cervical and oral cancers. Their full study can be seen in the latest edition of the Journal of the National Cancer Institute.
 

Better Outlook for Economy
Even though the actual figures are not available yet, the outlook of the economy of Costa Rica for the year 2004 is positive.

Analysts base this assert on a likely improved performance of international economy and on the behavior of the domestic variables.

Economist Felix Delgado pointed out that the analyses by the World Bank and the International Monetary Fund suggest larger world economic activity, as compared to the years 2003 and 2002.

This means incentives for international trade and, therefore, more income for Costa Rica through larger exports. In the domestic scenario, the handling of the monetary and fiscal policies must focus on maintaining economic stability in order to promote expansion, Delgado added.