Current Events

Keurig Green Mountain Inc. (GMCR), a maker of home-brewing machines for beverages, is recalling more than 7 million coffee-making systems after reports of people being burned by hot liquid that sprayed from the devices.

The company will recall about 6.6 million of its Keurig MINI Plus brewing systems in the U.S. and 564,000 in Canada after around 200 reports of water overheating and spraying out of the machines, including 90 incidents of burn-related injuries, according to the U.S. Consumer Product Safety Commission. The item has been sold at major retailers since 2009 for about $100, the CPSC said today in a statement.

Read more.

The global auto industry had plenty to worry about in 2014 as it navigated shifting technological and economic tides, the usual brutal forces of competition and consolidation, and a host of other threats: volatile fuel prices, the technological arms race toward battery- and hydrogen-electric vehicles, maturing developed markets, the rise of mobility-sharing apps such as Uber and the specter of self-driving cars. But an even greater horror stalked the auto industry this year, leaving a trail of dead customers, baffled executives and livid regulators: Takata's exploding air bags.

Read More.

General Motors Co.’s ignition switch compensation fund said Monday it received another 104 claims for compensation over the last week — including nine death claims — but no new payouts were approved.

In total, GM compensation adviser Kenneth Feinberg has approved claims for 42 fatalities and 58 injury claims linked to defective ignition switches.

Read More.

On Monday BMW became the latest automaker to cede to pressure from federal regulators to expand nationwide a recall of airbags made by the Takata Corporation that may be at risk of rupturing.

The German automaker said in a statement that it would replace driver-side airbags in approximately 140,000 BMW 3 Series vehicles in the United States, produced between January 2004 and August 2006.

Read More.

The Food and Drug Administration (FDA) is issuing new safety recommendations to protect children playing with toy laser guns and lightsabers.

“Many a kid who has seen Luke Skywalker battle Darth Vader with a lightsaber thinks lasers are cool,” the FDA writes in a blog post.

Read more.

Dizziness—a deficit in spatial perception that leaves people feeling lightheaded, unbalanced or disoriented—is one of the most common side effects of prescription drugs. Some of the most popular medications, including those that control high blood pressure or alter the neurochemistry of the brain, can intensify or cause dizziness in up to 30 percent of patients who take them, experts estimate.

Read more.

U.S. automobile recalls surpassed the 60 million mark for the first time in a single year, largely because of the rush to prevent more deaths from defective General Motors Co. (GM) ignition switches and Takata Corp. (7312) air bags.

The tally of 60.5 million through today is almost double the previous annual record of 30.8 million recalled vehicles set in 2004, according to an analysis of data on the website of the National Highway Traffic Safety Administration. The number will rise further as recent recalls that have been announced by automakers are recorded in the database.

Read more.

Diabetes drugs have been linked to thousands of deaths and hospitalizations over the last decade, an investigation by MedPage Today and the Milwaukee Journal Sentinel found — but there is little ability to determine exactly how risky the drugs may be to the public.

That's because the U.S. Food and Drug Administration's reporting system provides only a partial view of the potentially dangerous side effects of the dozensof drugs it approves every year.

Read more.

A U.S. judge has cleared the way for consumers to sue Target Corp over the retailer's late 2013 data breach that they say compromised their personal financial information.

U.S. District Judge Paul Magnuson in St. Paul, Minnesota, on Thursday dismissed claims by plaintiffs in certain states but largely denied Target's request to toss the proposed class action lawsuit.

Read more.

The federal office responsible for appeals for Medicare coverage has cut in half the waiting time for beneficiaries who are requesting a hearing before a judge.

The progress follows an announcement in January that officials were going to work through a crushing backlog by moving beneficiaries to the front of the line and suspending hearings on cases from hospitals, doctors and other providers for at least two years.

Read more.

A co-owner of a Massachusetts compounding pharmacy and its supervising pharmacist were indicted on federal charges Wednesday in connection with a multistate meningitis outbreak that killed dozens of patients who had received tainted steroids from the company in 2012.

Barry J. Cadden, a founder and owner of New England Compounding Center (NECC), and Glenn A. Chin, who oversaw production and personnel in the firm’s “sterile clean rooms,” face 25 charges of second-degree murder in the deaths of patients in seven states, including Maryland and Virginia.

Read more.