Current Events

A breast surgeon removes a suspicious lump found in the breast of a patient in Lanham, Maryland. Death rates from breast cancer are down by one-third from their peak.

The number of Americans dying from cancer has continued to fall since peaking in 1991, averting 1.5 million deaths that otherwise would have stemmed from one of the most feared diseases in the world.

The American Cancer Society, in its annual statistical report, estimates that 1.7 million Americans will be diagnosed with malignancies and 589,430 will die from them in 2015, roughly 1,600 people a day. Cancer already is the leading cause of death among Americans ages 40 to 79, and is expected to overtake heart disease as the nation’s top killer in the next several years, said Chief Executive Officer John R. Seffrin.

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Is that bean curd or turd in your Chinese takeout?

A Brooklyn-based food supplier to Chinese restaurants was cited for its alleged wonton disregard of sanitary codes – after rodent carcasses, feces and urine were found in a warehouse.

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Each day, attorney Terry Harris sets out in his trusty 2002 Honda Civic, which has 150,000 miles — and has been recalled for a variety of defects considered dangerous by safety regulators.

Two are for air bags that can explode, sending shrapnel into the cabin. Another aims to fix a wiring problem that could make the headlights shut off suddenly.

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Since the financial crisis, Wall Street firms have argued that they were victims, just like everybody else, of the bad mortgages that were churned out by subprime lenders like Countrywide and New Century.

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The city faces an avalanche of lawsuits from the East Harlem gas explosion that leveled two homes earlier this year.

Victims have filed paperwork indicating they’ll sue New York City regarding the March 12 blast, a spokesman for Controller Scott Stringer confirmed Monday.

The notices add up to 205 claims involving property damage, a variety of injuries and wrongful death.

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The law firm was unequivocal. It refused to take the case against General Motors involving a car crash that killed 18-year-old Natasha Weigel, saying that the value of her life in a lawsuit was too small to justify the expense and risk of litigation.

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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.

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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.

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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.

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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.

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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.

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