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| Lot of work left on Canada-EU trade deal, both sides say Thursday, Nov 01, 2012 12:03 PM PDT OTTAWA (Reuters) - Canada and the European Union still have plenty of work to do on a proposed free trade treaty that is supposed to be finished by the end of the year, officials from both sides said on Thursday. Canada, keen to diversify its exports away from the United States, says a deal with the European Union would increase two-way trade by 20 percent. The talks started in 2009. But several sensitive matters remain to be settled, including access for agricultural goods, opening up procurement markets and the extension of pharmaceutical patents. ... Full Story | Top |
| Catamaran raises profit forecast on Catalyst buy Thursday, Nov 01, 2012 11:46 AM PDT (Reuters) - Pharmacy benefit manager Catamaran Corp raised its earnings forecast for the year betting that it will benefit from the U.S. healthcare reform through its $4.4 billion acquisition of rival Catalyst Health Solutions. Catamaran, formerly known as SXC Health Solutions, said third-quarter revenue more than doubled to $3.2 billion as it added new customers and integrated the existing customers of Catalyst and HealthTran LLC, a pharmacy benefit manager (PBM) it bought earlier this year. Catamaran shares rose 9 percent to C$51. ... Full Story | Top |
| Hospitals sue government over private Medicare audits Thursday, Nov 01, 2012 11:08 AM PDT WASHINGTON (Reuters) - A coalition of hospitals sued the U.S. government on Thursday, claiming that private auditors hired to crack down on improper Medicare payments are denying hospitals hundreds of millions of dollars in legal payments for necessary care. The lawsuit alleges auditors known as Recovery Audit Contractors (RAC) forced hospitals to repay Medicare for the cost of in-patient services by determining months and sometimes years after the fact that beneficiaries should have been treated as out-patients instead of being admitted. ... Full Story | Top |
| Judge backs Catholic firm over contraception mandate Thursday, Nov 01, 2012 10:44 AM PDT (Reuters) - A Catholic-owned family business in Michigan does not have to comply with the provision of the new U.S. healthcare law that requires private employers to provide employees with health insurance that covers birth control, a federal judge in Detroit has ruled. U.S. District Judge Robert Cleland, in a ruling late Wednesday, temporarily blocked the government from forcing the owner of Weingartz Supply Company, which sells outdoor power equipment, to include contraception in its health coverage of employees. ... Full Story | Top |
| Many HIV patients skip medications to drink Thursday, Nov 01, 2012 10:32 AM PDT NEW YORK (Reuters Health) - In a new study, about half of HIV patients on antiretroviral therapy skipped their medications whenever they were drinking alcohol, an ill-advised behavior that could lead to higher viral loads, researchers say. Nearly 200 people with HIV who were on antiretroviral drugs and drank alcohol were followed for a year, and 51 percent stopped taking their medications while drinking - and those same patients tended to have higher viral loads, according to the new report. ... Full Story | Top |
| Russia breaks baby trafficking ring in North Caucasus Thursday, Nov 01, 2012 09:09 AM PDT MOSCOW (Reuters) - Russian investigators have cracked a ring of human traffickers that specialized in selling babies in the country's volatile North Caucasus region, Moscow's Investigative Committee said on Thursday. Police detained a 62-year-old woman in the regional capital of Chechnya when she tried to sell a newborn baby boy for 550,000 roubles ($17,500) to an undercover policeman posing as a potential client. The pensioner had also sold an 18-month-old girl to another undercover policeman earlier this year, the Investigative Committee said in a statement on its website. ... Full Story | Top |
| Insight: Crunching the numbers to boost odds against cancer Thursday, Nov 01, 2012 08:15 AM PDT  FRANKFURT (Reuters) - Software engineers are moving to the fore in the war on cancer, designing programmes that sift genetic sequencing data at lightning speed and minimal cost to identify patterns in tumors that could lead to the next medical breakthrough. Their analysis aims to pinpoint the mutations in our genetic code that drive cancers as diverse as breast, ovarian and bowel. The more precise their work is, the better the chance of developing an effective new drug. ... Full Story | Top |
| High-protein diet may help some people shed pounds Thursday, Nov 01, 2012 07:32 AM PDT  NEW YORK (Reuters Health) - Dieters who eat meals and snacks high in protein might lose a bit more weight than those who get less protein and more carbohydrates - all other things being equal, a new analysis of past studies suggests. Researchers found that over an average of 12 weeks, people assigned at random to a high-protein diet lost about 1.8 extra pounds, and more body fat, than those assigned to a standard-protein diet. ... Full Story | Top |
| Living at high altitude tied to developmental delay Thursday, Nov 01, 2012 07:10 AM PDT NEW YORK (Reuters Health) - South American babies and toddlers living at high altitude were more likely to score poorly on early tests of brain development, in a new study. Of all kids age three months to two years, one in five was at high risk of developmental delays, according to tests done at their pediatricians' offices. That rose to between one in three and one in four for those who lived above 2,600 meters, or 8,530 feet. ... Full Story | Top |
| Weak Prevnar vaccine, emerging market sales hit Pfizer Thursday, Nov 01, 2012 06:19 AM PDT  (Reuters) - Pfizer Inc reported on Thursday quarterly revenue well below Wall Street expectations, on disappointing sales of its Prevnar pediatric vaccine and a sharp pullback in emerging market revenue. Results were also hurt by weaker-than-expected sales of Pfizer's Lipitor cholesterol fighter, which has been facing cheaper generics since late last year. The largest U.S. drugmaker earned $3.21 billion, or 43 cents per share, in the third quarter. That compared with $3.74 billion, or 48 cents per share, in the year-earlier period, when the company recorded a $1. ... Full Story | Top |
| Sandy uproots Connecticut tree, 200-year-old human remains uncovered Thursday, Nov 01, 2012 05:26 AM PDT  (Reuters) - A Connecticut town got an unexpected history lesson after fierce winds from monster storm Sandy toppled a 103-year-old oak tree and exposed skeletal remains below it, officials said on Wednesday. The remains likely belonged to a victim of yellow fever or smallpox who might have been buried on the New Haven town green between 1799 and 1821, police spokesman David Hartman said. Headstones for those buried below the green were moved to a local cemetery in 1821, but the bodies of potentially thousands of residents were never relocated, he said. ... Full Story | Top |
| Sharp fears for future as Japan TV makers bleed Thursday, Nov 01, 2012 02:31 AM PDT  TOKYO (Reuters) - Struggling Japanese TV maker Sharp Corp warned it might not be able to survive on its own, as it almost doubled its full-year net loss forecast to $5.6 billion, and said it was considering alliances with other companies. In a statement, the company said it booked massive second-quarter losses and is seeing "serious negative operating cash flow." "This raises serious doubts about (our ability) to continue as a going concern," it said, adding it was taking steps, from pay cuts and asset sales to voluntary redundancies, to generate cash flow. ... Full Story | Top |
| Sony posts small second-quarter profit, keeps full-year forecast Thursday, Nov 01, 2012 12:25 AM PDT  TOKYO (Reuters) - Japan's Sony Corp booked a small operating profit in the second quarter, after a loss a year ago, helped by the sale of a chemicals business that offset weak demand for its TVs and other devices, and it kept its full-year profit guidance. July-September operating profit of 30.3 billion yen ($379 million) compared with a 1.64 billion yen loss a year ago, and was close to the average 33.8 billion yen profit estimated by five analysts surveyed by Thomson Reuters I/B/E/S. ... Full Story | Top |
| Republican candidate calls aborting rapist's child 'more violence on woman's body' Wednesday, Oct 31, 2012 09:41 PM PDT OLYMPIA, Washington (Reuters) - Tea Party politician John Koster, the Republican nominee for a hotly contested congressional seat in Washington state, says he opposes abortions, even in cases of "the rape thing," because it is tantamount to inflicting "more violence onto a woman's body." The Snohomish County councilman made the comments during a weekend fundraising appearance in the Puget Sound city of Everett, north of Seattle, that was captured in a recording released on Wednesday by the liberal activist group Fuse Washington. ... Full Story | Top |
| Sanofi draws fire over cost of MS drug Lemtrada Wednesday, Oct 31, 2012 05:03 PM PDT PARIS (Reuters) - Medical journal The Lancet warned that Sanofi's experimental multiple sclerosis drug Lemtrada may be too costly for patients and health insurers once it gets approved by regulators. The journal, which published the encouraging results of two late-stage Lemtrada tests on Thursday, also criticized the drugmaker's decision to withdraw leukemia therapy Campath, the same drug given at a different dosage, depriving MS patients who had been using it off-label. ... Full Story | Top |
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