Month: April 2015

U.S. government to pay New Mexico $73 million over radiation leak

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The U.S. Energy Department will pay New Mexico $73 million in road and other infrastructure projects for violations by an underground nuclear waste dump and nuclear research lab that led to a radiation leak last year, officials said on Thursday. The deal struck between the department and New Mexico forgoes fines and instead applies funds to upgrades to federal nuclear facilities and surrounding communities in the state, according to settlement documents. Projects include construction of a $5 million emergency operations center in Carlsbad, near where the nuclear waste dump leaked radiation in February 2014. The leak at the Waste Isolation Pilot Plant, or WIPP, exposed 22 workers to radiation in amounts not expected to threaten their health, and indefinitely suspended key operations at the site, the Energy Department’s only permanent underground disposal facility for certain types of radiological waste from U.S. nuclear labs.
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FDA approves the Medicines Co’s pain drug device Ionsys

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The U.S. Food and Drug Administration approved the Medicines Co’s drug device Ionsys for postoperative pain for hospital use, the company said on Thursday. Ionsys, a needleless, patient-controlled, opioid-based treatment, offers patients recovering from surgery in the hospital control over their analgesic dosing. Ionsys was originally developed by Johnson & Johnson and won approval in the United States and Europe in 2006.
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Bird flu outbreak could set U.S. record with ‘probable’ cases in Iowa

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By P.J. Huffstutter and Tom Polansek CHICAGO (Reuters) – The highly pathogenic H5 avian flu turned up in initial tests at five more farms in Iowa, including a commercial egg operation housing up to 5.5 million birds, Iowa’s agriculture department said on Thursday. If the virus is confirmed at the farms in additional tests under way at a U.S. Department of Agriculture laboratory, the total number of American cases could surpass 20 million birds and result in the biggest death toll in a bird flu outbreak in U.S. history. Avian flu at the egg farm in Buena Vista County, where workers saw an unexpected jump in bird deaths before the flock was tested, could be the largest single farm operation to be hit in the current outbreak. The egg farm’s owner, Rembrandt Foods, one of the top U.S. egg producers, confirmed the outbreak but disputed the number of birds affected.
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