Nation briefs 7/25/05

Health officials puzzle over abortion pill deaths

LOS ANGELES -- Federal health investigators are baffled about why four California women have died from a bloodstream infection after using a controversial abortion pill. Two of the deaths -- one this year and one last year -- were reported last week by the Food and Drug Administration. The other two deaths occurred in 2003. All were caused by sepsis, a bloodstream infection, health officials say. Sold as Mifeprex, and also known as RU-486 or mifepristone, it is taken as two pills at different times. None of the women who died followed FDA-approved instructions for taking the drug, and authorities are looking into whether that may have played a role in their deaths.

Rain eases fire threat in southern Utah

SALT LAKE CITY -- Overnight rain and lower temperatures helped give firefighters the upper hand Sunday on two huge fires that had threatened three separate communities in southwest Utah. Fire officials said Sunday that an 18,300-acre group of fires 12 miles north of St. George was 70 percent contained. About 10 miles north of the city, a group of seven fires that had burned into one covering more than 17,800 acres was 30 percent contained.

NASA will launch shuttle regardless of fuel gauge

CAPE CANAVERAL, Fla. -- NASA plans to launch the first space shuttle flight in 2 1/2 years, even if it is plagued by the same fuel gauge problem that halted the previous countdown two weeks ago, officials said Sunday. Discovery is set to lift off Tuesday at 10:39 a.m., the same time Columbia took off on its doomed mission in 2003. At an evening news conference, Hale and other NASA officials stressed that they will proceed with a liftoff only if the problem is well understood and involves the gauges in question -- anything else will result in a postponement.

White House won't release all Roberts' documents

WASHINGTON -- The Bush administration does not intend to release all memos and others documents written by Supreme Court nominee John Roberts during his tenure with two Republican administrations, a White House representative said Sunday. Fred D. Thompson, the former Tennessee senator who is guiding Roberts through the nomination process on behalf of the White House, said material that would come under attorney-client privilege would be withheld. A leading Senate Democrat disputed the assertion that privacy was at stake and called such a position a "red herring."

-- From wire reports