Asbestos News Roundup: 1.7.10

January 7th, 2010. By LucyC

A roundup of recent asbestos-related news and information  that you should be aware of.

Asbestos Hot Spots

Roanoke, VA:  A 1952 time capsule scheduled for unveiling on Thursday, January 7^th, is delayed indefinitely due to the presence of asbestos in the floor tiles surrounding the time capsule.

Robert Parker, a spokesman for the Virginia Dept of Health, said that it’s not uncommon for materials of that era to contain asbestos. He said he’s curious to see what’s inside the time capsule, which will be opened after proper assessments and remediation have been done. The capsule was filled by city and health officials 58 years ago. (wsls.com)

Asbestos in Schools

Montclair, NJ: Officials from the Montclair School District have closed part of Glenfield School this week, following evidence that flooring tiles damaged in a flood over the Christmas break, contain asbestos. A heating pipe burst and damaged tiles in the boys’ locker room located in the middle of the school, but the area was quickly contained. According to the Environmental Protection Agency (EPA), “intact, undisturbed asbestos-containing materials generally do not pose a health risk. These materials may become hazardous and pose increased risk if they are damaged, are disturbed in some manner, or deteriorate over time and release asbestos fibers into building air.”

The Asbestos Hazard Emergency Response Act administered by the EPA recommends that asbestos in school buildings be managed “in place.” According to the EPA, removal of asbestos-containing materials is not usually necessary unless the material is severely damaged or will be disturbed by a building demolition or renovation project. (northjersey.com)

Washington County, MD: The Washington County Board of Education has approved using three firms for asbestos abatement within its schools, if and when needed. According to Tony Suranno, an environmental safety specialist for Washington County Public Schools, 35 of 48 school buildings have asbestos. (herald-mail.com)

What the Heck Does “Off-Label” Mean, Anyway?

January 7th, 2010. By Kristine B

One of the phrases we at LawyersandSettlements.com see frequently is “prescribed for off-label uses.” In fact, we see it a lot. But, we realized that not everyone understands what “off-label uses” actually means, or what its implications are. So, this week’s Pleading Ignorance examines the off-label use of drugs. (I promise this won’t be too painful). 

When a drug is approved by the FDA it’s approved for specific circumstances (meaning, for specific health problems) and, often, for specific people (usually defined by an age range, e.g. adults). That’s because the drug has been tested and shown to be beneficial in treating those health problems in that group of people. 

When a drug is prescribed for off-label use, the drug is being used either for a condition that it was not approved to treat or for a person outside the group listed in the prescribing information or both. 

According to a report at USA Today (11/25/08), a study published in Pharmacotherapy listed 14 drugs that should be studied further regarding their off-label use. Those drugs include Seroquel, an antipsychotic medication that is approved to treat schizophrenia and short-term manic or depressive episodes in bipolar disorder. However, according to researchers, in three out of four cases, the drug has been used off-label, for maintenance therapy of bipolar disorder. Other drugs included on the list, as cited at The Wall Street Journal blog (11/25/08) were Coumadin, Lexapro, Risperdal and Singulair. 

It’s not illegal to prescribe drugs for off-label uses. Doctors are allowed to prescribe an FDA- Read the rest of this entry »

Food for Thought: Calorie Counts Inaccurate

January 6th, 2010. By Kristine B

So, if you’re anything like me, you probably made one of those oh-so-common New Year’s resolutions. In fact, my bet is many of us out there resolved to ourselves at around midnight on New Year’s Eve that this year, we were going to lose some weight (and every year around this time, I begin to really regret that resolution—oh chocolate, how I miss you). For some people, it’s a couple of pounds, for others, it’s a bit more. But, regardless of how much we had to lose, we all went into January 1, 2010 thinking about dropping some pounds and fitting into a smaller clothing size. 

The next few days are spent making healthy decisions. I’ve had more salads over the past few days than I had in all of December. Those healthy decisions include checking the calorie counts of any foods we buy and choosing lower calorie foods at restaurants (oh French fries, how I miss you). So, I can imagine many of you were shocked, like me, to learn that some foods in grocery stores and restaurants carry inaccurate calorie counts. 

Don’t get me wrong, I didn’t expect that the calories would be correct right down to the decimal. Especially with restaurant foods, there is a bit of give and take—sometimes the chef uses a little Read the rest of this entry »

Asbestos News Roundup: 1.5.10

January 5th, 2010. By LucyC

A roundup of recent asbestos-related news and information that you should be aware of.

Asbestos Lawsuits

Los Angeles, CA: Famed footballer Merlin Olsen who played for the Los Angeles Rams and went to become a sports caster and actor, is reportedly suing NBC Studios Universal, 20th Century Fox Film Corporation, Sherwin Williams, Lennox Industries and other companies alleging that they negligently exposed him to asbestos. Olsen has developed mesothelioma, a rare form of cancer that can result from asbestos exposure. He is currently undergoing chemotherapy. According to media reports, Olsen’s claim states that mesothelioma “is a vicious, painful, and invariably fatal malignancy.” (TMZ.com)

Asbestos Fraud

St. Louis, MO: The owner of J & C Environmental Services has pled guilty to a felony charge of making false statements on government documents regarding an asbestos inspection for a building scheduled for demolition. Calvin Burks could face up to 10 years in prison and a $250,000 fine.

Burks allegedly did more than a hundred asbestos inspections in and around the St Louis area starting in April 2008, in buildings scheduled for demolition. He would provide false data in the reports to contractors, who paid him $150 per report, which they would then file with the Environmental Protection Agency. The reports would allegedly clear the way for local and federal authorities to authorize demolition of the buildings which were later found to contain asbestos. (asbsestosweb.org)

Asbestos Hot Spots

San Francisco, CA: The Hunter Point Naval Shipyard has been the topic of much controversy for years, due to project underway designed to revitalize San Francisco’s south eastern waterfront. The project has been generating what is believed to be toxic dust containing asbestos, and area residents have complained of nosebleeds, headaches and other health problems during the past several years. However, the Environmental Protection Agency has submitted a draft report which reportedly states that the monitoring procedures are minimizing “dust generation and limiting asbestos exposure.” Still, residents remain skeptical, questioning the EPA’s testing methods, stating that individual residents were not screened for health problems by the EPA. The project involves the construction of 10,500 homes over two decades. (SFGate.com)

Moose Takes Nose Dive into Diner

January 4th, 2010. By AbiK

When was the last time you stepped into a place that used taxidermy as art? It actually hasn’t been that long for me—just last week in fact at Thomas Edison’s house in West Orange, NJ. But before that, it was a college-aged roadtrip to a rinky-dink bar in the backwoods of Amish country—the sort of place loaded with baseball caps, beards, camouflage attire—and Red White & Blue on tap. And more animal heads on the walls than patrons on barstools—one assumes, even on a good night. 

And that’s the interesting thing about taxidermy—it’s equally high-end or low-brow—and, it’s pretty polarizing to boot. 

But now it’s the center of a NYC personal injury lawsuit. Not taxidermy in general, but one moose head in particular—or as has been reported in the NY Daily News, a caribou head. 

It seems that Raina Kumra was dining under the aforementioned head on October 4^th when she came head-to-head (forgive the pun) with it. Lucky for her it wasn’t antler-to-head. Be that as it may, she’s since sued the eatery, White Slab Palace, which is located at Delancey and Allen in NYC. What she’s suing for is an “unspecified amount”; what she’s suing for is, according to the suit, that she’s “lost cognitive skills and suffered chronic neck pain, fatigue, dizzy spells and anxiety from mounting medical expenses.” 

I can only imagine that Ms. Kumra was a tad bit embarrassed in the aftermath of the moose (er, caribou) lunging at her. And let’s face it, with a reported weight of 150 lbs. and an antler span of Read the rest of this entry »