Birth control on 'soap operas'?

SANTA MONICA. California: Daytime television serial executives met on Friday to ponder how to make love in the afternoon, responsibly, reports AP.

The two day soap opera summit." which features talks by Surgeon General Joycelyn Elders and Jan© Fonda, is sponsored by Population Communications International, a group concerned about overpopulation. ,

PCI chairman Sonny Fox. a former vice president of children s programming at the NBC television network, said he hopes to persuade the executives to think about population control when writing story lines.

He contends the daytime series are more Influential than other shows because they're on every day and viewers identify heavily with the characters.

The teen-age viewers are. In particular, watching the soaps to develop their expectations of what their sex Ilves might be Mke.' Fox said.

The often melodramatic serials are known as "soap operas" in the United States because they were originally aimed at housewives and featured commercials for dish soap and other household products. "Love in the afternoon" was the slogan one TV network used to promote its serials.

Just how steamy are the stories that dominate midday TV?

This year, soap ppera programming showed 6.64 incidents of sexual activity or references to sex per episode, said Michigan State University Professor Bradley Greenberg. The Incidents and references range from sex out of wedlock to prostitution and artificial Insemination

Greenberg opened the summit with the release of his daytime drama study.

At a news conference. Greenberg said sex is usually portrayed as something desirable, though rarely in a lighthearted trjanner.

"Sex on the soaps 18 serious.", he said., adding. "Except for rape, people are happy about what they are doing."

Nine days on leaves!

BANGKOK: A Slngaporian tourist lost in a Thai national ’ park said Monday he survived the nine-day ordeal by eating leaves as leeches aod ticks fed on his blood, reports Af.

Koh Kim Ho. a 26-vear-old painter, was hiking with seven friends in Hat Yai when he decided January 14 to climb to a higher level of a waterfall alone.

His friends agreed to wait for him at the bottom, but Koh lost his way in the thick forest 930 kilometres south of Bangkok The friends alerted authorities when Koh failed to show up. sparking an exhaustive search with dofes and helicopters

Everyday I heard many people call my name, dogs barking and helicopters Koh said from his hospital bed. "But 1 could not find a wav to reach them

Pranee Bcxinyang. his Thai friend, said Koh was bathing In a waterfall when three men spotted him and called authorities Koh was rescued Sunday in lorn shorts, his body covered In scratches and leeches and ticks feeding on his legs, she said *

A nurse at Hat Yai hospital who demanded anonymity, said Koh was weak and had suffered a seizure because he had been without medicine, he takes regularly to control them. But the nurse said he was otherwise recovering well.