Roanoke Times
                 Copyright (c) 1995, Landmark Communications, Inc.

DATE: THURSDAY, May 17, 1990                   TAG: 9005170305
SECTION: BUSINESS                    PAGE: B-9   EDITION: METRO 
SOURCE: Associated Press
DATELINE: WASHINGTON                                LENGTH: Medium

INFLATION UP, BUT SLOWING

Overall, consumers received their first break since a cold snap sent prices soaring at the beginning of the year.

But that news was tempered by the fact that health care costs skyrocketed 0.8 percent in April. It was the third increase at that level, according to the Labor Department's Consumer Price Index.

Health care costs were up 8.9 percent from a year ago.

The government said declines in the cost of vegetables, fuel oil and women's clothing offset the higher health care costs to restrain the overall increase.

The rise in the Consumer Price Index was held to a seasonally adjusted 0.2 percent in April, the most modest gain in seven months.

"We're correcting from the unusually high prices of the winter," said economist Donald Ratajczak of Georgia State University in Atlanta. " . . . You could argue the worst of inflation is behind us, certainly for this year."

The index, spurred by weather-related increases in food and energy prices, soared 1.1 percent in January and climbed 0.5 percent in February and March.

The latest inflation report fits with recent employment, retail sales and industrial production figures that show a return to slow growth in April.

In April, food and beverage prices fell 0.2 percent, the first decline since July 1987. Non-alcoholic beverage and dairy product prices were down, while prices rose for cereal and bakery products, beef, pork, sweets and oils.

Fresh vegetable prices, which rose 29.2 percent in the first two months of the year, fell 15.5 percent last month, bringing the decline for March and April to 19.8 percent.