Current Events

Brake problems have prompted Nissan to recall about 153,000 sport utility vehicles from the 2013-14 model years and Suzuki to recall 210,000 motorcycles, the manufacturers have informed the National Highway Traffic Safety Administration.

The Nissan recall covers the 2013-14 Nissan Pathfinder, the 2013 Infiniti JX35 and the 2014 Infiniti QX60, according a report Nissan posted on the N.H.T.S.A. Web site. About 101,000 of those are Pathfinders. Nissan says that during light braking on rough roads, the antilock braking system can allow “stopping distances that are longer than customer’s expectation for the given pedal force. This may increase the risk of a crash.”

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The Justice Department plans to use its tentative $13 billion settlement with JPMorgan Chase as a blueprint for reaching similar deals with other banks in probes related to bad mortgages and the 2008 financial crisis, a law enforcement official familiar with the negotiations said Monday.

If such an effort is successful, it could usher in an era of high-priced settlements throughout the banking industry.

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Boston Scientific Corp. (BSX) agreed to pay $30 million to settle a whistle-blower lawsuit alleging the company’s Guidant unit knowingly sold defective heart devices, U.S. officials said.

Guidant, which Boston Scientific bought in 2006 for $27.5 billion, was accused of hiding defects in its Prizm line of heart defibrillators from patients, doctors and the U.S. Food and Drug Administration, the U.S. Justice Department, which joined the suit, said today in statement.

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(Reuters Health) - More patients are filing claims after being burned, scarred or otherwise injured during laser surgeries performed by non-doctors, a new study shows.

Researchers found 75 out of 175 legal cases related to procedures like laser hair or scar removal involved someone other than a physician operating the laser.

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The safety of Ariad Pharmaceuticals Inc. (ARIA)’s leukemia drug Iclusig is being investigated by U.S. regulators because of the increasing frequency of reports of serious blood clots and narrowing of blood vessels in patients.

“Health-care professionals should consider for each patient, whether the benefits of Iclusig treatment are likely to exceed the risks of treatment,” the U.S. Food and Drug Administration said today in a safety announcement. The agency urged doctors and patients to report side effects of the drug.

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The number of victims in the national outbreak of salmonella linked to raw chicken rose to 317 Friday, health officials reported.

The illnesses have been reported in 20 states and Puerto Rico, the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention said. The majority of cases, 73%, have been in California. No deaths have been reported.

The outbreak has been linked to chicken from three Foster Farms processing plants in central California, the Department of Agriculture said.

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The Department of Agriculture will not close the California chicken-processing plants linked to a nationwide outbreak of antibiotic-resistant salmonella, officials said.

"Foster Farms has submitted and implemented immediate substantive changes to their slaughter and processing to allow for continued operations," USDA spokesman Aaron Lavallee said Thursday evening.

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Two liberal House Democrats are warning that a recent salmonella outbreak is a sign of a coming “catastrophe” that could make some food-borne illnesses nearly impossible to prevent.

Rep. Louise Slaughter (D-N.Y.) on Tuesday said that increasing amounts of antibiotics fed to livestock and chickens are producing drug-resistant strains of bacteria, making outbreaks harder to contain.

“We believe we’re on the edge of a catastrophe,” she said.

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Health officials are advising consumers to stop using a dietary supplement product labeled as OxyElite Pro because of a cluster of hepatitis cases in Hawaii among people who used the weight-loss supplement. They are also investigating whether it is linked to other cases nationwide.

Hawaii's Department of Health is investigating 29 cases of hepatitis that have led to two liver transplants and one death. Eleven patients were hospitalized.

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Thousands of contaminated or potentially tainted medications have made it to market over the past year after laboratories responsible for testing custom-made pharmaceutical products failed to follow proper procedures, FDA records show.

The Food and Drug Administration uncovered the problems during a series of surprise inspections at dozens of specialty pharmacies over the past year, prompted by last fall’s deadly meningitis outbreak tied to tainted steroid injections made by one of the pharmacies, New England Compounding Center (NECC).

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A scientific panel that shaped the federal government’s policy for testing the safety and effectiveness of painkillers was funded by major pharmaceutical companies that paid hundreds of thousands of dollars for the chance to affect the thinking of the Food and Drug Administration, according to hundreds of e-mails obtained by a public records request.

The e-mails show that the companies paid as much as $25,000 to attend any given meeting of the panel, which had been set up by two academics to provide advice to the FDA on how to weigh the evidence from clinical trials. A leading FDA official later called the group “an essential collaborative effort.”

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