Current Events

When American doctors give their patients narcotic painkillers, 99 percent of them hand out prescriptions that exceed the federally recommended three-day dosage limit, new research suggests.

And some doctors exceeded that limit by a lot: Nearly one-quarter gave out month-long dosages, despite the fact that research has shown that a month's use of prescription narcotic painkillers can cause brain changes, the National Safety Council survey found.

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Soon after doctors at UCLA's Ronald Reagan Medical Center traced deadly infections to tainted medical scopes last year, they pressed the device maker to lend them replacements.

But Olympus Corp. refused. Instead, the Tokyo company offered to sell UCLA 35 new scopes for $1.2 million — a 28% increase in price from what it charged the university just months earlier, according to university emails obtained from a public-records request.

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General Motors is recalling about 3,200 of its 2016 Chevrolet Malibus in the U.S. and Canada to replace side-impact air bag assemblies.

Two weld studs that secure the front- and rear-side-impact air bag assemblies could fracture and separate when the air bag deploys. As a result the inflated cushion may not remain in its intended position and may separate from the seat, increasing the risk of injury to occupants.

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A federal judge this week ruled that five women who claim they were harmed by Essure sterilization coils can go ahead with their lawsuit against coil-maker Bayer Healthcare.

Bayer, which is facing a barrage of lawsuits across the country, had asked that the case be dismissed because the U.S. Food and Drug Administration in 2002 gave premarketing approval to Essure, a status that shields devices from product liability litigation in state courts.

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Thirty-two women sued pharmaceutical giant Bayer AG here Friday, claiming “serious and permanent injuries” as a result of their use of a controversial birth control device, the firm representing them said.

The suit claims that Essure, a device consisting of two metal coils implanted in the fallopian tubes, is flawed, and that Bayer and the original manufacturer, Conceptus Inc., concealed the risks from consumers.

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A ProPublica analysis has found for the first time that doctors who receive payments from the medical industry do indeed tend to prescribe drugs differently than their colleagues who don’t. And the more money they receive, on average, the more brand-name medications they prescribe.

We matched records on payments from pharmaceutical and medical device makers in 2014 with corresponding data on doctors’ medication choices in Medicare’s prescription drug program. (You can read our methodology here.)

Doctors who got money from drug and device makers—even just a meal– prescribed a higher percentage of brand-name drugs overall than doctors who didn’t, our analysis showed. Indeed, doctors who received industry payments were two to three times as likely to prescribe brand-name drugs at exceptionally high rates as others in their specialty.

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Johnson & Johnson was ordered to pay $502 million to a group of patients who accused the company of hiding flaws in its Pinnacle artificial hips that caused the devices to prematurely fail and left them facing surgeries and pain, in J&J’s first loss over the products.

A federal-court jury in Dallas concluded Thursday that artificial hips sold by J&J’s DePuy unit under the Pinnacle brand name were defective and company officials knew about the flaws but failed to warn patients and doctors of the risks. They awarded $142 million in actual damages and $360 million in punitive damages to a group of five patients whose hips broke down and had to be surgically removed.

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A federal judge has refused to dismiss a proposed class action lawsuit accusing CVS Pharmacy Inc of selling a protein powder supplement with misleading nutrition claims on its label.

U.S. District Judge Thomas Durkin in Chicago ruled Tuesday that the suit, brought under Illinois and common law, is not preempted by federal law.

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While a harsh national spotlight focuses on the drinking water crisis in Flint, Mich., a USA TODAY NETWORK investigation has identified almost 2,000 additional water systems spanning all 50 states where testing has shown excessive levels of lead contamination over the past four years.

The water systems, which reported lead levels exceeding Environmental Protection Agency standards, collectively supply water to 6 million people. About 350 of those systems provide drinking water to schools or day cares. The USA TODAY NETWORK investigation also found at least 180 of the water systems failed to notify consumers about the high lead levels as federal rules require.

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US Attorney Preet Bharara is taking aim at the New York City Housing Authority — probing whether the beleaguered agency lied about its use of lead paint, new court papers reveal.

Manhattan’s top prosecutor is actively investigating “health and safety conditions” in NYCHA buildings, including “potentially false claims” that it may have made in order to obtain federal funding, prosecutors wrote in papers filed Wednesday in Manhattan federal court.

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SAN DIEGO – Bumble Bee Foods, LLC announced today that it is voluntarily recalling 3 specific UPC codes of canned Chunk Light tuna due to process deviations that occurred in a co-pack facility not owned or operated by Bumble Bee. These deviations were part of the commercial sterilization process and could result in contamination by spoilage organisms or pathogens, which could lead to life-threatening illness if consumed.

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