Friday, January 29, 2010

Necklace Recall

FAF Inc. Recalls Children’s Necklaces Sold Exclusively at Walmart Stores Due to High Levels of Cadmium

WASHINGTON, D.C. – The U.S. Consumer Product Safety Commission, in cooperation with the firm named below, today announced a voluntary recall of the following consumer product. Consumers should stop using recalled products immediately unless otherwise instructed.

Name of Product: Children’s Metal Necklaces

Units: About 55,000

Importer: FAF Inc., of Greenville, R.I.

Hazard: The recalled necklaces contain high levels of cadmium. Cadmium is toxic if ingested by young children and can cause adverse health effects.

Incidents/Injuries: None reported.

Description: The recalled jewelry is shaped as a metal crown or frog pendant on a metal link chain necklace in a crown hinged box. The packaging has the words, “Disney” and “The Princess and the Frog” on it and contains the following model numbers and UPC codes:
Crown Model # 4616-4187 UPC # 72783367144
Frog Model # 4616-4190 UPC # 72783367147

Cadmium poisoning is an occupational hazard associated with industrial processes such as metal plating and the production of nickel-cadmium batteries, pigments, plastics, and other synthetics. The primary route of exposure in industrial settings is inhalation. Inhalation of cadmium-containing fumes can result initially in metal fume fever but may progress to chemical pneumonitis, pulmonary edema, and death.[24]

Cadmium is also a potential environmental hazard. Human exposures to environmental cadmium are primarily the result of the burning of fossil fuels and municipal wastes.[25] However, there have been notable instances of toxicity as the result of long-term exposure to cadmium in contaminated food and water. In the decades leading up to World War II, Japanese mining operations contaminated the Jinzu River with cadmium and traces of other toxic metals. As a consequence, cadmium accumulated in the rice crops growing along the riverbanks downstream of the mines. The local agricultural communities consuming the contaminated rice developed Itai-itai disease and renal abnormalities, including proteinuria and glucosuria.[26] Cadmium is one of six substances banned by the European Union's Restriction on Hazardous Substances (RoHS) directive, which bans certain hazardous substances in electronics.

Cadmium and several cadmium-containing compounds are known carcinogens and can induce many types of cancer.[27]

Research has found that cadmium toxicity may be carried into the body by zinc binding proteins; in particular, proteins that contain zinc finger protein structures. Zinc and cadmium are in the same group on the periodic table, contain the same common oxidation state (+2), and when ionized are almost the same size. Due to these similarities, cadmium can replace zinc in many biological systems, in particular, systems that contain softer ligands such as sulfur. Cadmium can bind up to ten times more strongly than zinc in certain biological systems, and is notoriously difficult to remove. In addition, cadmium can replace magnesium and calcium in certain biological systems, although these replacements are rare.

Source is wiki. http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Cadmium#ToxicityNecklace

Tuesday, January 26, 2010

List of Georgia Truck Companies

Georgia

Command Motorways - Atlanta Value Transportation- Cartersville
Eastern Service Corporation - Columbus Taylor McLean Trucking - Doerun
Nova Logistics - Kennesaw RB & G - LaGrange
Mac-Ran Enterprises - Lawerenceville Hudson Group - Marietta
Condor - Perry

Georgia Dump Truck Accident?

Recent dump truck accidents have involved rear-end collisions, wheels hitting other vehicles or pedestrians, intersection collisions, construction site accidents, and pedestrian back-overs.

Let our lawyers investigate your potential case:

More than one party may be liable (legally responsible) for a dump truck accident:

* The owner of the dump truck
* The driver of the dump truck
* The employer of the dump truck driver
* A parent company of the owner of the dump truck or employer of the driver
* The manufacturer of the dump truck
* A third-party maintenance company
* The driver and owner of another vehicle
* The manufacturer of another vehicle


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US Government Bans Truckers from Texting

The government Tuesday formally barred truckers and bus drivers from sending text messages while behind the wheel, putting the federal imprimatur on a prohibition embraced by many large trucking and transportation companies.

"We want the drivers of big rigs and buses and those who share the roads with them to be safe," said U.S. Transportation Secretary Ray LaHood. "This is an important safety step, and we will be taking more to eliminate the threat of distracted driving."

Although both houses of Congress are considering bills restricting texting and 19 states have banned the practice, LaHood said existing rules on truckers and bus drivers give him authority to issue the prohibition. LaHood said drivers of commercial vehicle caught texting could be fined up to $2,750.

source:http://www.washingtonpost.com/wp-dyn/content/article/2010/01/26/AR2010012602031.html

Automobile Accident in Brunswick?

From segeorgialaw.com:

This website was started for one simple reason – to let folks who live in Southeast Georgia – Brunswick, Nahunta, Waycross, Homerville, Kingsland, St. Mary’s, and our counties – Camden, Glynn, Charlton, Brantley – know that you don’t have to pick up the phone and talk with a Florida-based lawyer to help you get justice.

Accomplished, plain talking conservative lawyers who work for consumers- not big Insurance Companies – are ready to talk with you, meet with you, and work for you right here in South Georgia.

Keep More of Your Settlement

In this economic times, you can’t afford to be hurt for any reason. If someone injures you or your family costing you time from work, making you pile up medical bills, and pain, we understand. That’s why attorneys’ fees are less – and only if we recover money for you. Call us first.

We simply believe that if you’re hurt, the justice system should work for you and your family; it does not exist to line the pockets of lawyers.

Huber Needles Recall

More than two million Huber needles -- about a third of the number used in the U.S. with implanted ports to treat chronic diseases -- have been recalled, the FDA announced.

The needles can cut the resealing silicone septum of the ports and possibly send slivers of the material into the body, with the potential to cause embolisms and other damage, according to Mary Brooks, RN, of the FDA's Center for Devices and Radiological Health.

The material could also lodge in the needle, restricting the flow of medication to the patient.


The recall affects needles made between January 2007 and August 2009 by Japan's Nipro Medical Corp. and imported by Exelint International Corp., of Los Angeles.

The recalled needles have lot numbers that begin with either 07, 08, or 09, and one of the following product codes or catalog numbers:

* Exel/Exelint Huber Needles Product Codes/Catalog Numbers: 26901, 26902, 26904, 26906, 26907, 26908, 26909, 26911, 26921, 26922,26923, 26924, and 26925
* Infusion Sets Product Codes/Catalog Numbers With/Injection Site: 27940R, 27941R, 27944R, 27945R, 27946R, 27948R, 27949R, and 27950R
* Infusion Sets Product Codes/Catalog Numbers Without/Injection Site: 27954R, 27955R, 27958R, and 27959R
* Exel/Exelint "SecureTouch +" Safety Huber Sets Product Codes/Catalog Numbers: 37854S, 37855S, and 37858S

http://www.fda.gov/NewsEvents/Newsroom/PressAnnouncements/ucm198676.htm

Texting Train Engineer Caused Rail Crash

NTSB investigators determined the weather in the San Fernando Valley was clear on September 12, 2008. Equipment on the Metrolink locomotive and on the tracks was working properly.

They also concluded that veteran engineer Robert Sanchez was distracted by texting and failed to see a red signal after his locomotive pulled away from Chatsworth Station. His northbound train smashed into a southbound Union Pacific freight train minutes later. Sanchez died in the crash.

In all, 25 people were killed, including one passenger who’d been in Metrolink’s Glendale crash in 2005. Another 135 people were injured.

NTSB chair Deborah Hersman says Sanchez texted constantly while on the job.

“There was a violation of company policy and it was flagrant, it was consistent and it was longstanding,” said Hersman. “It was not a ‘one-off’ event. This operator sent and received upwards of 95 text messages that day.”

http://www.scpr.org/news/2010/01/21/ntsb-blames-engineer-in-metrolink-crash/

Monday, January 11, 2010

Hurricane Katrina: Lawsuit Proceeds Hospital today in LA

From the USA Today:

Once the power blinked out, Althea LaCoste's lungs were on their own. She struggled to breathe without the help of a respirator, and even a team of nurses hand-bagging air into her ailing lungs couldn't save her, according to court documents. LaCoste, 73, died before she could be evacuated from Pendleton Memorial Methodist Hospital in the chaotic days after Hurricane Katrina.

LaCoste's death 4½ years ago is at the center of a civil lawsuit being heard here that could have far-reaching implications for hospitals across the country. The lawsuit against Methodist Hospital is the first civil suit alleging negligence of a hospital staff in Katrina's aftermath.

Here is the article: Link.

I disagree with a hospital industry's statement in that article that:"A verdict against the hospital would open up a Pandora's box for other unrelated incidents," Also, a professor remarked: "The LaCoste lawsuit could make hospitals across the country liable if their power gets knocked out by snowstorms, tornadoes or other calamities, says Edward Sherman, a Tulane University law professor following the case."

Here, you have a case not relating to medical malpractice, in a state where the laws are different that those of any other state. As one authority explains: Great differences exist between Louisianan civil law and common law found in all other American states. Property, contractual, business entities structure, much of civil procedure, and family law are still strongly influenced by traditional Roman legal thinking. Louisiana law retains terms and concepts unique in American law: usufruct, forced heirship, redhibition, and lesion beyond moiety are a few examples.

Second, it's one thing to read the pleadings, the issues, and the allegations/admitted facts. It's quite another to suggest that a snowstorm will now cause liability to arise in say Iowa because of one jury verdict in Louisiana.

If you do nothing else this year, read The Great Deluge. It's a detailed look at what happened just before, during, and after Katrina not only in New Orleans but in the Gulf South.

Seroquel: Delaware Cases Dismissed

Last week, Judge Slights granted So far, six Delaware Seroquel cases have been tossed.

Two test cases in the federal multidistrict litigation in Orlando have also failed to withstand AstraZeneca summary judgment motions based on Daubert challenges to plaintiffs' experts. All eight Seroquel cases that have come up for trial, in other words, have ended with pretrial wins for AstraZeneca.


Source here.

Saturday, January 9, 2010

Powerful Opinion Piece on Georgia's Victims of Medical Wrongdoing

This is a must read. I take it whole cloth from http://georgiajustice.blogspot.com/:

In Georgia, Middle Ground for Victims of Medical Wrongdoing?
How many hoops should you have to jump through to get justice? It's a fair question that many people struggle with. Yesterday, the CEO of a Georgia medical services company suggested - in an opinion piece submitted to a GA newspaper - that to be sure that Georgians who have been harmed by negligent medical care are worthy of justice we should subject them to one more hoop. Not coincidentally, it's a hoop that benefits only medical professionals and insurance companies – the only two interest groups that profit when injured patients are prevented from securing justice.

What the author of the opinion has proposed is that, instead of allowing victims of medical malpractice the same Constitutional Right to Trial by Jury enjoyed by all other Georgians, people harmed by medical wrongdoing/malpractice would have to get permission to have a jury trial from a “screening panel” comprised of members of the medical and insurance industries, the same industries that want to avoid compensating injured patients. This approach is wrong and adds an unnecessary, ineffective layer to our civil justice system.

The fact is all medical malpractice cases brought in Georgia have already been through multiple screening hoops. The first hoop is that you have to have had something very bad happen as a result of malpractice. Your next hoop is that you have to find a lawyer willing and able to take your case. That lawyer will tell you that there is another, special hoop that protects only professionals charged with negligence. In order to pass through that hoop, the patient must find a medical professional willing to publicly criticize their colleague and sign a document swearing that malpractice happened. So far your case has been screened three times: Something bad happens. You find a lawyer who will invest in helping you find justice. And, you find another doctor who agrees that there was malpractice and is willing to say so. Then there’s a fourth screening before you can have a jury hear your case: the judge must screen the case, too.


Our Founding Fathers created the world's best independent screening panels when they imbedded the right to a trial by jury in our Constitution. You are entitled to a jury of your peers, not a two step process, the first of which is a trial by jury of the defendant's colleagues. We trust the people of our communities to fairly resolve our disputes when we are unable to resolve them ourselves.

The CEO cites an approach tried in Maine as being the right fit for us here in Georgia. He fails to mention that this approach is regularly criticized by the Supreme Court of Maine as being inadequate and harmful to the people of Maine. He cites, as a reason for needing “screening panels,” a Georgia case involving a plastic surgeon who carelessly destroyed the blood supply to a woman’s face and left her horribly disfigured. He suggests that this woman – who was horribly injured through no fault of her own and who successfully navigated all of the legal hurdles to hold the wrongdoer accountable for herself and other patients – has not done enough. He says she needs to clear yet another hurdle to prove herself worthy of a jury trial. The suggestion is outrageous and it serves no purpose but to deny those who have been harmed their fair measure of justice.


Why should patients who have been harmed by medical malpractice have to go through two trials when everyone else only has to go through one? Why should medical professionals get special treatment? It's a question with an obvious answer: They shouldn't.