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| U.S. lawmakers unveil $1.1 trillion spending bill, no Obamacare increase Monday, Jan 13, 2014 07:54 PM PST  By David Lawder WASHINGTON (Reuters) - Negotiators in the U.S. Congress on Monday unveiled a $1.1 trillion spending bill that aims to prevent another government shutdown while boosting funding levels slightly for military and domestic programs - but not for "Obamacare" health reforms. With a deadline looming at midnight Wednesday for new spending authority, lawmakers will still need a three-day stop-gap funding extension to ensure enough time for passage of the spending bill this week. The measure eases across-the-board spending cuts by providing an extra $45 billion for military and domestic discretionary programs for fiscal 2014, to a total of $1.012 trillion. The shutdown was prompted largely by disputes over funding for "Obamacare" health insurance reforms. Full Story | Top |
| Ex-California policemen acquitted in beating death of mentally ill transient Monday, Jan 13, 2014 06:03 PM PST  By Dana Feldman SANTA ANA, California (Reuters) - Two former policemen were acquitted on Monday in the 2011 beating and stun-gun death of a mentally ill California homeless man that touched off street protests and political upheaval in the Los Angeles suburb of Fullerton. Ex-Fullerton police officers Manuel Ramos and Jay Cicinelli were found not guilty of all charges linked to the death of 37-year-old Kelly Thomas following a month-long trial, according to a spokeswoman for the Orange County District Attorney. The eight-woman, four-man jury deliberated for less than two days before returning the verdicts in a packed Santa Ana, California courtroom. Ramos, 39, was charged with second-degree murder and involuntary manslaughter in the case. Full Story | Top |
| Penis pumps cost U.S. government millions, watchdog cries waste Monday, Jan 13, 2014 05:26 PM PST Penis pumps cost the U.S. government's Medicare program $172 million between 2006 and 2011, about twice as much as the consumer would have paid at the retail level, according to a government watchdog's report released on Monday. The report by the inspector general for the Department of Health and Human Services said Medicare, the government health insurance system for seniors, paid nearly 474,000 claims for vacuum erection systems, or VES, totaling about $172.4 million from 2006 to 2011. According to the Mayo Clinic, penis pumps are one of a few treatment options for erectile dysfunction. "Medicare payment amounts for VES remain grossly excessive compared with the amounts that non-Medicare payers pay," said the report, dated December 2013. Full Story | Top |
| Tap water use ban lifted in parts of West Virginia after spill Monday, Jan 13, 2014 04:38 PM PST  West Virginia officials on Monday lifted a ban on drinking or bathing with tap water in some areas of the state hit by a chemical spill that affected hundreds of thousands of people for five days, Governor Earl Ray Tomblin said. Officials had ordered some 300,000 people not to drink their tap water after as much as 7,500 gallons (28,000 liters) of the 4-methylcyclohexane methanol, or crude MCHM, leaked into the river. Jeff McIntyre, president of West Virginia American Water Co, said the first area cleared for use was in downtown Charleston, the state capital. Full Story | Top |
| Judge rejects inmate's challenge of Ohio's new execution method Monday, Jan 13, 2014 04:24 PM PST By Kim Palmer CLEVELAND (Reuters) - A challenge to Ohio's new two-drug execution protocol was rejected by a federal judge on Monday, clearing the way for the state to put to death this week a man convicted of a 1989 rape and murder. Dennis McGuire, 53, is due to die on Thursday by a lethal combination of a sedative, midazolam, and a pain killer, hydromorphone. Ohio, like many other states, was forced to change its protocols for lethal injections because the manufacturer of pentobarbital has banned its sale for executions. The execution is to be carried out at an Ohio state prison. Full Story | Top |
| Agreement reached on details of $1 trillion spending bill: Mikulski Monday, Jan 13, 2014 03:59 PM PST By David Lawder WASHINGTON (Reuters) - Negotiators in the U.S. Congress have reached agreement on a $1 trillion spending bill aimed at keeping the federal government open through September 30, Senate Appropriations Committee chairwoman Barbara Mikulski said on Monday. Mikulski told reporters that the measure will reverse planned military pension cuts for disabled veterans and does not contain any provision that blocks the implementation of "Obamacare" health insurance reforms. But asked whether President Barack Obama's signature health care reform law will get an increase in funding, she declined to answer, saying only, "Obamacare lives another day." The spending measure fills in the details of a budget agreement passed in December, following a 16-day shutdown of many government agencies in October that was prompted largely by disputes over Obamacare funding. Another shutdown was scheduled to occur at midnight Wednesday if Congress failed to approve new spending authority, and a three-day temporary extension will be needed to get the full spending bill passed this week. Full Story | Top |
| Wave of lawsuits follows West Virginia chemical spill Monday, Jan 13, 2014 03:50 PM PST  By Mica Rosenberg NEW YORK (Reuters) - People whose drinking water was contaminated in West Virginia have filed at least 18 lawsuits in state court against two companies after a chemical spill affected 300,000 residents and shut down businesses and schools. Lawyers started filing suits last Friday in West Virginia's Kanawha County court, less than 24 hours after the first alarms were sounded about the release of an industrial chemical into the Elk River. None of the 18 cases filed against Freedom Industries, which owned the leaky chemical storage tanks, and a water processing plant upstream, have been certified yet as class actions, according to a court clerk. "We're receiving calls by the minute regarding the situation that's occurred following the spill," said Bernard Layne, a personal injury attorney in the state capital Charleston who filed the first claim when the court opened on Friday morning. Full Story | Top |
| Agreement reached on $1 trillion U.S. spending bill: Mikulski Monday, Jan 13, 2014 03:26 PM PST  WASHINGTON (Reuters) - Negotiators in the U.S. Congress have reached agreement on a $1 trillion spending bill for consideration this week in an effort to stave off another government shutdown until at least September 30, Senate Appropriations Committee chairwoman Barbara Mikulski said on Monday. The bill, which is expected to be filed at 8 p.m. EST (0100 GMT), eases some of the across-the-board "sequester" spending cuts by boosting spending on domestic and military programs during the 2014 fiscal year by $45 billion. ... Full Story | Top |
| Hollande bids to deflect glare from private life to reforms Monday, Jan 13, 2014 03:06 PM PST  By Mark John PARIS (Reuters) - President Francois Hollande will aim at a news conference on Tuesday to set out plans to revive the weak French economy and deflect questions about his private life after allegations surfaced of a secret love affair with an actress. His New Year's encounter with journalists in his Elysee Palace will be the French leader's first public appearance since a celebrity magazine on Friday published photos it said showed Hollande making a nocturnal visit to a lover. The saga took a surprise new turn on Sunday when it emerged that his long-term partner, Valerie Trierweiler, had been admitted to hospital in a state of shock. "This major political event must remain a major political event," David Assouline, spokesman for Hollande's Socialist party, said of the 4:30 p.m. (10.30 a.m. ET) news conference, an annual setpiece which could go on as long as two hours. Full Story | Top |
| Youth participation low in early Obamacare enrollment Monday, Jan 13, 2014 02:57 PM PST  By David Morgan WASHINGTON (Reuters) - The new private health plans available under Obamacare drew in fewer young and healthy Americans than needed for the administration to make healthcare reform a market success in the first wave of enrollment, an official report showed on Monday. Twenty-four percent of the 2.2 million people who signed up for private coverage between October 1 and December 28 belonged to a target audience of 18- to 34-year-olds, according to the first administration report to provide a demographic breakdown on enrollment in the new plans offered under President Barack Obama's healthcare law. That compares with a target of closer to 38 percent set before the program's botched October 1 rollout, when administration officials believed that about 2.7 million of a forecast 7 million enrollees for 2014 would be between 18 and 35. Health policy experts say the administration may still get closer to that ratio by the time enrollment closes at the end of March, when more young Americans are expected to sign up to avoid the law's penalty for not having any coverage. Full Story | Top |
| Minority children use appropriate car seats less often Monday, Jan 13, 2014 02:29 PM PST By Kathryn Doyle NEW YORK (Reuters Health) - Many kids are not put in car seats and booster seats as recommended, studies have shown. A new report suggests use may be particularly low among non-white children. "We expected that differences in family income, parental education, and sources of information would explain the racial disparities in age-appropriate restraint use and they did not," lead author Dr. Michelle L. Macy told Reuters Health by email. Certain parents may face barriers to car seat and booster seat use that researchers haven't discovered yet, Macy, a pediatrician at the University of Michigan in Ann Arbor, said. Full Story | Top |
| Tap water use OK'd in some West Virginia areas after spill Monday, Jan 13, 2014 02:27 PM PST West Virginia officials on Monday lifted a ban on drinking or bathing with tap water in some areas of the state hit by a chemical spill that affected hundreds of thousands of people for five days, Governor Earl Ray Tomblin said. Officials had ordered some 300,000 people not to drink their tap water after as much as 7,500 gallons (28,000 liters) of the 4-methylcyclohexane methanol, or crude MCHM, leaked into the river. Jeff McIntyre, president of West Virginia American Water Co, said the first area cleared for use was in downtown Charleston, the state capital. Full Story | Top |
| Regeneron, Bayer to co-develop Eylea combination treatment Monday, Jan 13, 2014 02:25 PM PST (Reuters) - U.S. based-Regeneron Pharmaceuticals Inc and Germany's Bayer AG said they would co-develop an antibody for use in combination with Eylea, their treatment for a form of age-related blindness. Bayer's unit, Bayer HealthCare, will pay Regeneron $25.5 million upfront and share global development costs for the program, the companies said in a joint statement. Both the Eylea injection and the new combination treatment is to treat wet age-related macular degeneration (wet AMD) - the leading cause of blindness in the elderly. "Given the multi-factorial nature of wet AMD, there is a potential for additional benefits to patients by addressing different pathways responsible for this devastating condition", Bayer HealthCare global development head Kemal Malik said. Full Story | Top |
| Screen pregnant women for gestational diabetes: panel Monday, Jan 13, 2014 02:04 PM PST  By Andrew M. Seaman NEW YORK (Reuters Health) - Reinforcing an already common practice, a government-backed panel says women should be screened for gestational diabetes after 24 weeks of pregnancy even if they don't have symptoms. The U.S. Preventive Services Task Force (USPSTF) says all pregnant women who have not been previously diagnosed with diabetes should be given a blood test for the condition, which increases the risk of complications during and after birth. "Gestational diabetes is an important condition to consider," Dr. Wanda Nicholson told Reuters Health. "It affects two people - a mother and her offspring." Nicholson is an immediate former member of the USPSTF and an associate professor in the Department of Gynecology and Obstetrics at the University of North Carolina at Chapel Hill School of Medicine. Full Story | Top |
| Colorado to launch 'don't drive stoned' ads with U.S. funding Monday, Jan 13, 2014 01:59 PM PST  By Keith Coffman DENVER (Reuters) - Colorado will warn motorists against driving stoned in a campaign backed by $430,000 in new federal funding, officials said on Monday, two weeks after the first U.S. recreational marijuana retail shops opened in the state. A series of television public announcement spots will air across the state beginning in March, warning drivers that offenders will face similar penalties to those caught driving under the influence of alcohol, said Emily Wilfong, a spokeswoman for the Colorado Department of Transportation. Handouts and posters will be distributed at the state's marijuana shops as part of the public service campaign funded by the National Highway Traffic Safety Administration, she said. In 2012, voters in Washington state and Colorado approved the possession of small amounts of cannabis by adults, although the drug remains illegal under federal law. Full Story | Top |
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