November 19, 1998

Connecticut Gov John G Rowland and New England Patriots owner Robert K Kraft on Nov 19 will announce that they have agreed to move National Football League team from Massachusetts to downtown Hartford; state officials have agreed to build stadium for Kraft in return for 10 percent of its revenues over 30 years of agreement; stadium is expected to take two to three years to build; first games would be played in stadium in 2001; stadium will be part of redevelopment project on Connecticut River that will include convention center and hotel that will cost state $350 million; planners say whole project could cost as much as $1 billion, with additional costs paid by private investors and Federal Government; Kraft will pay no money for stadium, but will be expected to help pay for another part of project; photo (M)

New York State election officials, with counting of paper ballots nearly done in attorney general's race, say that Eliot L Spitzer, Democratic challenger, is maintaining thin 22,334-vote lead over incumbent Dennis C Vacco; lawyers for Vacco's campaign go to State Supreme Court to challenge vote count in New York City, saying that there are widespread discrepancies in counting (M)

New York Mets hold news conference to re-introduce recently acquired outfielder Bobby Bonilla; says they have resigned pitcjer Dennis Cook and have upgraded their offer to free agent B J Surhoff (M)

Imported Western pharmaceuticals have taken China by storm, straining pocketbooks as they hold out promises of cure; Western drug companies have been aggressively courting China's doctors and hospitals not only with new pills, but also with gifts, money and even kickbacks, practices that are banned in US; their goal: to gain access to China's 1.2 billion potentially ailing citizens, most with seemingly unshakable belief in curative power of name-brand Western pills; doctors say that Western medicines and medical equipment have contributed to medical costs that are rising 35 percent a year in China; photo (M)

Article on plight of Jan Binder, 38-year-old mother of two young children from Sycamore, Ill, who has repeatedly tried to stop smoking since her husband died of lung cancer year and half ago, but nothing has worked; photo (M)