Nurse Will Summon Doctors to Testify in Defense of Teddy Bears : Humanitarianism: They will back her contention that the stuffed animals can be therapeutic for sick children and that a shipment should be allowed to go to Iraq.

Amid signs that the teddy bear blockade may be weakening, a Santa Barbara nurse whose relief shipment of medicine, used clothing and toys was halted by U.S. officials, will marshal an array of experts today to bolster her crusade to deliver the toys to Iraqi children.

Dianne Judice, the nurse who organized the “Teddy Bears for Iraq” humanitarian effort, has argued that the toy critters, by virtue of their therapeutic value, should not be banned from Iraq. Medicine, food and some other humanitarian aid is allowed under the terms of the U.N. embargo intended to pressure Iraq into reforming its political system.

U.S. State Department officials have refused to allow stuffed toy animals under the terms of the embargo, disputing suggestions that the items may be considered medicinal. Allowing such merchandise could set a precedent that could weaken the effect of the sanctions, officials say.

But doctors, Judice contends, are far more qualified to define what is and is not medicinal than government officials.

Teddy bears are definitely therapeutic, said Dr. Van Dyke De Golia, a child and adolescent psychiatrist at St. John’s Hospital. He is one of three doctors scheduled to appear at a press conference at the Los Angeles Press Club today as part of a campaign to increase public pressure on both U.S. and U.N. officials.

“Providing teddy bears is an absolutely wonderful idea where most kids have experienced post-traumatic stress disorder from witnessing the bombing and the destruction of the homes and cities,” De Golia said.

Dr. Marjorie Braude, chief of psychiatry at Westwood Hospital, emphasized that such “transitional objects”--teddy bears, security blankets, favorite toys--may not only put a smile on a child’s face, but could actually help speed a child’s recovery from sickness.

“There’s a whole body of information that psychological forces profoundly affect the body’s response to a disease,” Braude said. Considerable research shows that “cells that fight disease are influenced by psychological events,” she said, “so that anything that provides psychological support to a sick child has a direct effect on enabling that child’s system to fight the disease.”

Braude cited a study by a team of doctors from Harvard University who visited Iraq after the war and inspected 19 public health facilities. They concluded that damage to plumbing, sewer systems, power plants and other aspects of the public health infrastructure had left a legacy of rampant disease and malnutrition so severe that it would result in the deaths of more than 200,000 children under the age of 5 within the next year as a result of the war.

Judice said the psychiatrists are among many people who were outraged by the news that the fuzzy-wuzzy cargo had been halted by authorities on Jan. 29. More than 1,000 pounds of medicine, old clothing and stuffed animals have languished in a warehouse at Los Angeles International Airport.

“We are doctors. We are nurses. We know our own expertise,” said Judice, who formerly worked in pediatrics. “I’m just trying to let the government people know in a nice way that it is not their expertise.”

Judice said she believes that the officials have softened their hard-line stance since news reports appeared. Authorities, she said, have consistently told her that medicine could be shipped but that teddy bears could not. In one instance an official told her she could not transport the toys to refugee camps in Jordan, which is not under embargo, because her intent was to deliver the teddy bears to Iraq.

But since then, she says, officials have helped her navigate the bureaucracy to enable her to ship the medicine and used clothing to Iraq.

In a Feb. 19 letter to Judice, R. Richard Newcomb, a Treasury Department official, affirmed that the medicine could be shipped to Iraq under the license of Catholic Relief Services. He said more information was needed before approval could be granted for the shipment of used clothing and that the stuffed animals could be transported as far as Jordan.

Steve Dykema, a Treasury Department spokesman, said he was unable to confirm whether, as Judice contends, one official suggested that teddy bears might be therapeutic in Western nations, but would have no such value in Iraq because of cultural differences.

Hanaa al-Wardi, an Iraqi-American who has worked with Judice on the teddy bear crusade, recalled making a stuffed toy dog when in the first grade.

Al-Wardi, 42, says she still has her little stuffed dog.

It was not unusual, she said, to see a child play with a stuffed dubba --the Arabic term for bear.

“It is so insulting,” al-Wardi said, “for them to think like Iraq is another planet.”