Bayer and Johnson & Johnson have agreed to settle more than 25,000 US lawsuits alleging that their blockbuster blood thinner Xarelto caused unstoppable and in some cases fatal bleeding, court documents showed.

The total amount of $775m (€685m) due in the settlement will be shared equally by the two companies, which jointly developed the drug. Bayer and J&J do not admit liability under the agreement.

The settlement will resolve all pending US lawsuits over Xarelto, which plaintiffs claimed caused uncontrollable and irreversible bleeding, leading to severe injuries and even death among thousands of patients.

Plaintiffs accused the drugmakers of having failed to warn about the bleeding risks, claiming their injuries could have been prevented had adequate information been provided.

Bayer in a statement on Monday said it continues to believe the claims are without merit

https://www.irishexaminer.com/breakingnews/business/bayer-and-jj-settle-us-lawsuits-over-blood-thinner-913259.html

A decision on whether to adopt copyright changes that would create a tighter grip over online content will be voted on by MEPs on Tuesday.

Supporters in the creative and music industry argue that the Copyright Directive will enable content makers to be fairly paid for their work, while opponents, including the tech giants themselves, fear the changes could have an impact on freedom of speech and expression online.

EU decision makers have been deliberating about the extent of the reforms for years, most recently tweaking the text to make some exemptions, such as non-commercial encyclopaedias like Wikipedia, and introducing protections for popular web memes.

Two parts of the law, Article 11 and Article 13, have been most contentious since talks started, with the likes YouTube warning that viewers across the EU could be cut off from videos.

Will the European Parliament listen to the unprecedented public opposition to #Article13 and other aspects of EU copyright reform? Here's how the vote will go down tomorrow at 12:30 CET, in detail: https://t.co/27CVaf4QpQ #SaveYourInternet pic.twitter.com/991ep37hTt

— Julia Reda (@Senficon) March 25, 2019

https://www.breakingnews.ie/showbiz/controversial-changes-to-eu-online-copyright-laws-set-for-final-vote-913315.html

Leaked Wikileaks Doc Reveals US Military Use of IMF, World Bank as “Unconventional” Weapons

This “U.S. coup manual,” recently highlighted by WikiLeaks, serves as a reminder that the so-called “independence” of such financial institutions as The World Bank and IMF is an illusion and that they are among the many “financial weapons” regularly used by the U.S. government to bend countries to its will.

WASHINGTON – In a leaked military manual on “unconventional warfare” recently highlighted by WikiLeaks, the U.S. Army states that major global financial institutions — such as the World Bank, International Monetary Fund (IMF), and the Organization for Economic Cooperation and Development (OECD) — are used as unconventional, financial “weapons in times of conflict up to and including large-scale general war,” as well as in leveraging “the policies and cooperation of state governments.”

The document, officially titled “Field Manual (FM) 3-05.130, Army Special Operations Forces Unconventional Warfare” and originally written in September 2008, was recently highlighted by WikiLeaks on Twitter in light of recent events in Venezuela as well as the years-long, U.S.-led economic siege of that country through sanctions and other means of economic warfare. Though the document has generated new interest in recent days, it had originally been released by WikiLeaks in December 2008 and has been described as the military’s “regime change handbook.”

https://www.mintpressnews.com/leaked-wikileaks-doc-reveals-how-us-military-uses-of-imf-world-bank-as-unconventional-weapons/254708/

Duke University to Pay $112.5 Million to Settle Claims of Research Misconduct

Duke University will pay $112.5 million to the federal government to settle allegations that researchers submitted applications and reports containing falsified data to win more than two dozen grants from the National Institutes of Health and the Environmental Protection Agency, the Justice Department said on Monday.

“Taxpayers expect and deserve that federal grant dollars will be used efficiently and honestly,” Matthew G.T. Martin, United States attorney for the Middle District of North Carolina, said in a statement. “May this serve as a lesson that the use of false or fabricated data in grant applications or reports is completely unacceptable.”

The allegations were initially made in a whistle-blower lawsuit brought by Joseph Thomas, a research analyst who worked in Duke’s pulmonary division. He claimed that another researcher, Erin Potts-Kant, had fabricated data linked to as much as $200 million in federal research grants.

https://www.nytimes.com/2019/03/25/science/duke-settlement-research.html

>>5893568

One Nation refers Al Jazeera to police over secret gun lobby recordings

One Nation has referred Qatari-owned media outlet Al Jazeera to the Australian Federal Police, after a years-long sting operation caught senior party figures seeking multimillion-dollar donations from the US gun lobby.

The investigation - in which a reporter set up a fake pro-gun organisation in order to mingle with top-level figures in the United States' National Rifle Association - secretly recorded two senior advisers to One Nation leader Pauline Hanson during their visit to Washington in September last year.

https://www.smh.com.au/politics/federal/one-nation-refers-al-jazeera-to-police-over-secret-gun-lobby-recordings-20190326-p517ky.html