Defective & Dangerous Products

• Is Secondhand Smoke Setting Future Consumers Up For the Kill?

  Armand Rossetti | February 07, 2007 7:34 AM | 0 CommentsWest Palm Beach, FL

  Currently, smoke-free laws are in place in several states and thousands of U.S. communities. Smoke-free statutes and ordinances now protect over 50% of the U.S. population. But what about millions of children who are exposed to secondhand smoke on a daily basis? After decades of court battles against tobacco companies, the first battle occurring in 1954, are they still capitalizing on these...

• Tobacco Will Kill More People than AIDS by 2015

  John Hopkins | November 28, 2006 8:41 PM | 0 CommentsWest Palm Beach, FL

  A study by the World Health Organization has concluded that tobacco smoking will kill 50 percent more people than AIDS by the year 2015 and will be responsible for 10 percent of all deaths globally. The report is a chilling prediction of a disease process created and manipulated by Big TobaccoTobacco, currently blamed for some 5.4 million deaths a year, is set to kill 6.5 million in 2015 and 8.3...

• Experimenting with Young Lives Does Not Show Good Judgment

  John Hopkins | November 21, 2006 4:21 PM | 0 CommentsWest Palm Beach, FL

  The US Army has taken to using a drug, used to coagulate blood, in combat field hospitals. The drug, Recombinant Factor VII, is designated for use with rare forms of hemophilia. Hemophilia is a disorder that can cause patients to literally bleed to death from something as incidental as bumping against a table. The drug was the subject of an FDA warning last December in which the FDA said that...

• Philip Morris continues Big Tobacco's duck and cover

  Cal Warriner | September 12, 2006 2:44 PM | 0 CommentsWest Palm Beach, FL

  As Gomer Pyle used to say, "Surprise, Surprise, Surprise." Having been hammered in Federal Court and again by the Massachusetts Department of Health study finding ever increasing nicotine levels in Marlboro cigarettes Philip Morris denies the validity of the Massachusetts study.At the same time, when asked pointedly whether Philip Morris adds nicotine to its cigarettes, its spokesman withheld...

• How Do the Recent Tobacco Decisions Affect Florida Lawsuits

  Staff Writer | August 23, 2006 11:31 AM | 1 CommentWest Palm Beach, FL

  Fellow InjuryBoard Blogger Bob Carroll does a great job breaking down the effect of recent court decisions on Florida tobacco lawsuits. When the Florida Supreme Court upheld a lower court's decision to throw out $145B awarded to a class of Florida smokers, the door was opened for individuals harmed by Big Tobacco to file individual lawsuits.As Bob points out in his post:In Florida, on the other...

• Alleged illegal practices at FDA’s medical device Office may be jeopardizing public safety

  Armand Rossetti | November 20, 2008 3:21 PM | 0 CommentsWest Palm Beach, FL

  The FDA directs the Center for Devices and Radiologic Health (CDRH), which is The Office in charge of regulating medical devices. Recently, a group of scientists who review device safety at the...

• China's Version of the FDA--Tough Place to Work

  John Hopkins | July 17, 2007 9:56 AM | 0 CommentsWest Palm Beach, FL

  China has certainly suffered its share of setbacks in the export of products to the rest of the world. They have allowed tainted toothpaste to leave their country and deadly dog & cat food to be exported. Most recently, it was discovered that Chinese tires were manufactured without including the material that binds the belts together. China's response to this event has been essentially two-fold....

• Babies should not be left asleep in car seats

  John Hopkins | December 08, 2006 1:18 PM | 0 CommentsWest Palm Beach, FL

  The British Medical Journal reporst that babies left in car seats to sleep may be at risk for suffocation. Apparently, because babies' heads tend to loll forward, pressing the jaw against the chest and this can cause the already relaxed throat muscles to permit severe airway constriction. The study group stressed that the findings should in no way cause people to fail to use car seats for...

• Merck Rushing to Profit?

  John Hopkins | November 14, 2006 9:03 AM | 0 CommentsWest Palm Beach, FL

  The Palm Beach Post reported that Merck is asking the FDA for approval of a new drug they hope will replace Vioxx; probably both in use and significant sales. The new drug is called Arcoxia and it has been received to very mixed reviews. The physician participating in the clinical trials, Dr. Christopher Cannon, indicated that all the COX-2 drugs probably have some risk of cardiac complications,...

• "Crackberry" Addiction is Upon Us

  John Hopkins | October 10, 2006 9:06 AM | 0 CommentsWest Palm Beach, FL

  The sky is falling; aliens are orbiting the earth; and Blackberry devices can apparently give you withdrawal sickness. Rutgers just completed a study that concludes the revolutionary devices we all use while trying to walk down the hall or drive a car can cause email and internet addiction.Apparently, these very handy devices are causing users to become so hooked that many can not go for more...