Current Events in August 2017

Hurricane Harvey's impact on gasoline supplies and prices is beginning to be felt well outside the Texas Gulf Coast storm zone.

Gasoline prices at the pump are surging after Colonial Pipeline, which supplies fuel to wide areas of the eastern U.S., has shut down -- not because of storm damage but because the refineries that supply it are not producing fuel.

Colonial Pipeline's Line 2, which transports mainly jet fuel and diesel, shut down Wednesday evening. Line 1, which carries gasoline, was expected to shut down today.

"Once Colonial is able to ensure that its facilities are safe to operate and refiners in Lake Charles and points east have the ability to move product to Colonial, our system will resume operations," the company said in a statement.

Colonial said there are 26 refineries that supply its pipeline system and half are located between Houston and Lake Charles, La., the main area impacted by the storm.

We've seen this before

Nearly a year ago Colonial suffered a break in its Line 1 in Georgia, interrupting fuel supplies to the East Coast. It resulted not only in surging prices, but in lines at gas stations in Tennessee, where some stations' tanks ran dry. It took several weeks for prices to return to normal.

Overnight, retail gasoline prices surged in wide areas east of the Mississippi River. The AAA Fuel Gauge Survey shows the national average price of regular gasoline has jumped to nearly $2.45 a gallon, rising more than four cents in 24 hours. The average price of premium gasoline is now $2.93 a gallon, up nearly three cents over the same period. Diesel fuel rose less than two cents, to $2.56 a gallon.

The average price of regular in Texas today is $2.25, up four cents from yesterday and 11 cents higher than before Harvey hit.

South Carolina prices skyrocket

It's even higher, however, in South Carolina -- hundreds of miles from the storm zone -- and normally where consumers can buy the cheapest fuel in the nation. The statewide average in South Carolina today is $2.26 a gallon, a nearly eight cent surge in the last 24 hours and 20 cents higher than a week ago.

Missouri, another state with historically cheap gas, saw prices at the pump leap 10 cents a gallon overnight. The problem motorists in these states are encountering is getting their normal supplies of gasoline from Gulf Coast refineries to gas stations throughout the state.

"Many many gasoline racks in the Gulf, Southeast & Mid-Atlantic are inverted, a sign of major stress and supply that's quickly declining," Patrick DeHaan, senior analyst at Gasbuddy, said in a Thursday morning Tweet.

According to Reuters, the situation for consumers is likely to get worse before it gets better. The news agency reports two East Coast refineries have run out of fuel as they try to make up for shortages in the region. It quotes as "East Coast market source" as saying the situation is the worst in memory.

After months of record new car sales, consumers have taken a breather. Sales are off their highs, meaning buyers have a little more bargaining power.

At the same time, the huge number of cars coming off leases has inundated the used-car market, pushing prices lower. It seems there has never been a better time recently to buy a new or used car.

At least, that was the situation a week ago.

But now Hurricane Harvey has dumped more than 50 inches of rain on the Houston metro area, and that has resulted -- among other things -- in the flooding of an estimated 500,000 cars and trucks. Presumably, the owners of those totaled vehicles will soon be getting checks from their insurance companies and will be buying either new or used replacement vehicles. When that happens, there will be a surge in automotive demand and good deals will be harder to come by.

Turning on a dime

Industry experts say the market dynamic may turn on a dime. Before last weekend, the assumption was that the glut of used cars would depress the prices of both used and new cars. After the damage caused by Harvey, all bets are off.

In an interview with CNBC, Steven Wolf, chairman of the Houston Automobile Dealers Association, predicted a surge in demand for replacement vehicles in the next 30 days. Wolf said used-car prices are likely to quickly rise, though he thinks new cars will not see the same kind of upward pressure.

Labor Day weekend is usually a big promotional time for both new and used car dealers. Consumers outside of the Texas flood zone, who are in need of a new set of wheels, might be wise to take advantage of the sales.

Act before the price increase

While prices are already rising for used cars, you might be able to get a better deal now than you could a month from now. New car promotions are usually set up weeks in advance, so new-car Labor Day weekend promotions should not be affected.

The estimated half million cars and trucks flooded by Harvey's downpour should be headed for the scrap heap. As in almost every flood situation, a few will illegally make their way to the used car market.

Consumers don't have to worry about it when shopping this weekend, but in the weeks ahead used-car shoppers need to be wary of cars from Texas on the used car lot, especially if they smell musty and are beginning to show signs of rust.

On Tuesday, the Food and Drug Administration (FDA) issued an advisory warning stating that 465,000 pacemakers currently in use in the U.S. have cybersecurity issues and are vulnerable to hacking, though the number of devices affected globally may be closer to 750,000.  

The agency says that patients with radio frequency (RF)-enabled implantable pacemakers, originally manufactured by St. Jude Medical and now owned by Abbot, could be harmed by hackers who can make the devices pace too quickly or run down the batteries. However, Abbot has said that it is not aware of any cases of this happening and that it would involve a “highly complex set of circumstances,” according to a BBC report.

All consumers who have had the devices implanted are urged to consider applying a firmware update with the assistance of their health care provider.

Installing the update and associated risks

The FDA says that the affected devices include several St. Jude Medical pacemaker and CRT-P devices, including Accent, Anthem, Accent MRI, Accent ST, Assurity, and Allure. However, the warning does not apply to implantable cardiac defibrillators (ICDs) or to cardiac resynchronization ICDs (CRT-Ds).

On August 23, the agency approved a firmware update intended to patch the cybersecurity vulnerabilities, and it later became available on August 29. Officials say that pacemakers manufactured beginning on August 28, 2017 will have the update pre-loaded.

The firmware update will require an in-patient visit to a health care provider and will only take around three minutes to complete. The FDA says that while the update is taking place, devices will operate in backup mode and will pace at 67 beats per minute while retaining essential, life-sustaining features. After the update is installed, the devices will revert back to their pre-update settings. However, officials warn that the firmware update does come with certain risks.

“As with any firmware update, there is a very low risk of an update malfunction. Based on St. Jude Medical’s previous firmware update experience, installing the update firmware could potentially result in…malfunctions,” the FDA said. These include:

• A 0.161% chance of reloading a previous firmware version due to incomplete update;
• A 0.023% chance of losing currently programmed device settings;
• Loss of diagnostic data (none reported thus far); and
• A 0.003% chance of complete loss of device functionality.

Recommendations

The FDA and Abbot both urge users NOT to prophylactically remove or replace affected devices. Instead, consumers should talk with their health care provider to determine if the update is appropriate based on potential risks and benefits and proceed accordingly.

If possible, the FDA says that pacing-dependent patients should perform the firmware update at a facility where temporary pacing and pacemaker generator can be readily provided. Users should also print or digitally store their device settings and diagnostic data in case it is lost during the update. Lastly, the agency says to make sure the device is still functioning, not in backup mode, and set to programmed parameters after the update is complete.

For more information about the firmware update, consumers can contact an Abbot representative at 1-800-722-3774 or visit the FDA's site here.

It's hard to count how many rock and roll songs have been written over the years cursing the prospect of getting old. But AARP says getting old is not so bad.

The seniors advocacy group bases that on the results of a new survey of both older and younger Americans. Among those age 18 to 39, nearly half said they believed getting old would be depressing. However, among those 60 and up, only 10% felt that way.

The survey shows that seniors actually have a higher level of satisfaction with life than their younger counterparts.

"The findings of this new survey are further confirmation of something a lot of people, especially older people, know instinctively and that is that our upper ages can be great," said AARP CEO Jo Ann Jenkins. "However, I think the survey also presents a fairly stark reminder that we're all faced by a lot of negative associations around aging – some of it's 'in the culture' and some of it may be self-generated, but it's all damaging and, as this survey shows, it's often wrong."

Too much TV

But there are also obvious downsides to getting older unless you remain physically active, and a new study suggests the best way to promote activity and better health is to turn off TV.

The study by researchers at George Washington University (GW) shows seniors who watched five hours or more of TV a day and got fewer than three hours of physical activity per week were three times more likely to be unable to walk at the end of eight years.

Loretta DiPietro, who chairs the Department of Exercise and Nutrition Sciences at GW’s Milken Institute School of Public Health calls TV viewing a very potent risk factor for disability in older age.

Damage from physical inactivity

“Sitting and watching TV for long periods, especially in the evening, has got to be one of the most dangerous things that older people can do because they are much more susceptible to the damages of physical inactivity,” she warned.

The GW study followed men and women who were 50 to 71 years old at the start of the study and all were in good health. Eight years later, 30% of them had trouble walking or could not walk at all.

Those who watched five hours or more of TV per day were 65% more likely to be part of that 30%.

Other studies have warned of the dangers of too much sitting for all age groups. The lesson, says DePietro, is that seniors who want to remain fit as they age must get up and move around more, limiting their time on the couch.

In addition to shouldering the everyday stress of parenthood, single parents often have a greater financial burden to bear.

Scraping together enough money to cover the bill for groceries, childcare, and other expenses can be tough on a single income, but some states offer financial help for struggling single parents.

In a new study, GoBankingRates looked at eight key factors to find out which U.S. states are the most and least single-parent friendly.

New Jersey tops the list

To come up with its findings, the personal finance website looked at factors including each state’s median household income, average cost of groceries for a family, and the annual cost of childcare for two kids.

The study also looked at whether or not the state offers state support in the form of paid family leave, an earned-income tax credit on top of the federal credit, and whether the state has adopted the Medicaid expansion under the Affordable Care Act.

With a median household income of just over $72,000 and all three of the aforementioned single-parent support systems, New Jersey was found to be the best state for single parents to raise children.

Here are the top five best states for single parents to raise children, according to GoBankingRates:

• New Jersey
• Rhode Island
• Michigan
• Washington 
• Illinois 

Meanwhile, the states that offer the least support and financial security for single parents include Florida, Alabama, Mississippi, and surrounding southern states, according to the study.

Earlier this month, when excitement over the coming solar eclipse was still at its peak, Amazon issued a recall cautioning those who had purchased eclipse glasses on its site to not use them because they may not be safe.

However, a class action lawsuit alleges that the warning wasn’t sufficient and that the company should provide compensation to consumers who were harmed while using the products. Reuters reports that suit was filed in South Carolina on Tuesday evening by Corey Payne and his fiancée Kayla Harris, who purchased a three-pack of eclipse glasses on Amazon and subsequently suffered from headaches and vision impairment.

“As a result of Defendant’s negligence, false advertising and false marketing materials, Plaintiffs and members of the proposed class suffered and continue to suffer injuries and damages from Defendant’s sale of an unsafe product in violation of South Carolina law through failing to disclose the dangers of the product as known to Defendant and failing to adequately and fully compensate consumers for the harms they suffered,” the suit states.

Too little, too late

Although Amazon began notifying customers about certain glasses sold on its site weeks before the eclipse, Payne and Harris say that they never heard anything about it. The suit alleges that Amazon’s efforts were both vague and uninformative.

“Amazon attempted to recall its Eclipse Glasses on or about August 19, 2017, ‘out of an abundance of caution’ via email to its purchasers, offering a refund to affected customers but failing to disclose either the ‘scale of the recall or a public list of offending vendors,'” the suit says.

The suit is seeking class action status, compensation for damages suffered by plaintiffs, restitution for all monies wrongfully obtained by Amazon, injunctive relief barring Amazon from engaging in similar behavior in the future, and coverage for attorney’s fees and costs incurred by the plaintiffs. The case is being handled by the law firm McGowan, Hood & Felder, LLC based in South Carolina. 

Besides the blowback from the revelation that another 1.4 million customers may have fallen into the bogus account trap, Wells Fargo is now facing a class action lawsuit that says it bilked home loan borrowers by charging them extra fees when their applications were denied, even when the denail was because of a bank error. 

The case revolves around rate-lock extension fees -- the fees borrowers pay to "lock in" an interest rate for a specific period of time, usually 30 to 45 days. If it takes longer than that for the loan to be approved, the borrower is charged an extra fee.

The plaintiff in the suit, Las Vegas security guard Victor Muniz, alleges that he paid a $287 fee to extend his locked-in rate even though the delays in approval were caused by the bank, according to a Reuters report.

Muniz said the bank hired an appraiser who was out of the country at the time and could not complete the appraisal in the time permitted.

The suit charges that the bank's loan department was chronically understaffed and that many customers had to pay the extension fee because of delays caused by the bank's disarray.

The suit was filed by the Seattle law firm Keller Rohrbeck, the same firm that sued Wells Fargo in 2015 over the creation of bogus accounts, leading the bank to agree to a $142 million settlement. 

Deciding to start a family is a big decision, but one that many consumers have embraced at a young age in the past. However, recent research shows that prospective parents are now waiting a little longer to have kids.

A new study from Stanford University shows that fathers of newborns are 3.5 years older on average when compared to four decades ago, with men over 40 accounting for 9% of all U.S. births. The researchers attribute the shift to changing social roles and advances in contraception.

"We've seen a lot of changes in the last several decades. Contraception is more reliable and widespread. Women have become more integrated into the workforce. This seems to be reflected in an increasing parity in parental ages over the last four decades," said senior author Dr. Michael Eisenberg.

Parents waiting to have kids

The researchers came to their conclusions after analyzing data from the National Vital Statistics System, which tracked all 168,867,480 U.S. live births from 1972 to 2015.

Among the findings, the researchers say that the average paternal age when a child was born increased from 27.4 years to 30.9 years over the study period. Asian-American fathers from Japanese and Vietnamese backgrounds were the oldest on average when having a child, at just over 36 years old. Fathers with higher levels of education also tended to be older when they had their first newborn, at 33.3 years old.

Over the same time period, the researchers say that the percentage of newborns’ fathers over the age of 40 more than doubled, from 4.1% to 8.9%, while those over the age of 50 increased from 0.5% to 0.9%.

Of course, fathers haven’t been the only ones waiting to have children. In fact, Eisenberg points out that maternal ages at birth have advanced even more than paternal ages in the same timeframe.

“This may be a consequence of women waiting longer to get married or putting off childbearing as the years they spend in higher education increase and as careers become more central to their lives,” he said. “The result is that the average age difference between moms and dads has been shrinking, from 2.7 years in 1972 to 2.3 years in 2015."

The risks of waiting

While waiting longer to have children may be beneficial for some couples, the researchers point out that there are some inherent risks involved.

"Every potential dad acquires an average of two new mutations in his sperm each year. And there are associations between older fatherhood and higher rates of autism, schizophrenia, chromosomal abnormalities, some pediatric cancers and certain rare genetic conditions," said Eisenberg.

The researchers say that putting off having kids also holds negative implications for the economy. "Fewer people being born means fewer productive workers a generation down the road," Eisenberg added. "This can obviously have profound tax and economic implications.”

The full study has been published in Human Reproduction.

Johnson & Johnson last week was hit with a $417 million verdict after a California jury sided with plaintiff Eva Echeverria, who charged that her daily application of the company’s talcum powder had caused her to develop ovarian cancer in 2007.

The court case leading to the record-breaking verdict tells yet another dramatic story about a pharmaceutical behemoth’s betrayal of its female customer base. It’s a story that is all too familiar to Johnson & Johnson.

Power morcellators

The popular trend in medicine of “minimally invasive surgery” was bolstered in part by pharmaceutical companies selling devices that made certain new surgical techniques possible. A fast-track process called 510(k) allows companies to quickly get approval from the Food and Drug Administration to market new surgical tools, implants and other medical devices. The ease of this process has led critics and researchers to charge that devices do not get enough scrutiny from the Food and Drug Administration before landing in doctor’s hands.

Power morcellators would become a prime illustration for this concern. 

For gynecologists, the benefits seemed clear. Doctors treating women afflicted with uterine fibroids, benign but painful growths on the uterus, used to cut their patients open to remove the growths. But using the power morcellator, doctors could remove fibroids laparoscopically. The morcellator works by literally morcellating -- or mincing, slicing and dicing -- the fibroids and the uterus into minuscule pieces inside the patient’s body. This allows doctors to then remove the organ through a much smaller incision. 

It took pushback from an anesthesiologist-turned-activist and her outspoken husband, a heart surgeon, to question the wisdom of grinding up an unknown mass before it is removed from a patient.

“From a surgical perspective, it’s clear that indiscriminant morcellation of any tumor with malignant potential inside a patient’s body poses a prohibitive danger,” wrote Dr. Hooman Noorchashm, the heart surgeon married to activist Dr. Amy Reed.

Reed underwent what she was told would be a low-risk surgery to treat her uterine fibroids in 2013.  Doctors did not discover until after they performed the procedure that Reed was not suffering from fibroids but from uterine cancer. The morcellation device had likely caused her cancer to spread and metastasize. 

Caused the cancer to spread

As she grappled with a devastating Stage 4 cancer diagnosis, Reed and her husband lobbied medical authorities, politicians and journalists to scrutinize the use of morcellators in uterine surgery. The Food and Drug Administration finally relented and agreed to study the safety of morcellators. The agency reported that the morcellators were spreading undiagnosed cancer in an estimated 1 in 350 women, a figure that was “much higher than previously suspected rates of 1 in 10,000,” the FDA acknowledged.

Johnson & Johnson subsidiary Ethicon was the most high-profile manufacturer of laparoscopic power morcellators, and the FDA’s warnings about the device put the corporation under pressure. The FBI launched an investigation into Johnson & Johnson after the discrepancies in safety data came to light, and the FDA subsequently issued a “black box” warning on power morcellators. About 100 patients filed lawsuits claiming that the company’s researchers were aware of the risk that uterine tumors could be misdiagnosed as fibroids. 

Ethicon ultimately decided to pull its morcellator out of hospitals in 2014, explaining that “Ethicon believes that a market withdrawal of Ethicon morcellation devices is the appropriate course of action at this time until further medical guidelines are established and/or new technologies are developed to mitigate the risk.” Johnson & Johnson began settling the morcellator lawsuits last year.

But for Hooman Noorchashm, more work is yet to be done. The nation’s largest group representing gynecologists has cautiously continued endorsing the morcellation procedure, writing in a public statement that “we continue to believe that power morcellation has a role in gynecologic surgery.”

The morcellator used on Amy Reed was not developed by Johnson & Johnson but by competitor Karl Storz Endoscopy, whose morcellators have not been recalled. The couple battled the German device-maker in civil court and in an unusual strategy, announced that they would refuse to settle until Karl Storz takes its product off the market. That still hasn’t happened. 

Frustrated after Reed's death

Reed passed away from cancer in May 2017. Noorchashm, frustrated with a lack of a response from gynecologists, wrote an open letter to the American Society of Anesthesiologists on July 26, asking them to consider the death of their former colleague and to intervene in surgeries when gynecologists try to use morcellators. "It takes no amount of effort for any reasonable physician to understand that mincing up tumors with malignant potential inside a human body cavity is a prohibitively dangerous practice -- because it risks spreading or upstaging a deadly process,” he told the anesthesiology society.

Society of Anesthesiologists spokesman Theresa Hill writes to ConsumerAffairs that evaluating the safety of morcellation is outside their scope of operations, but that their ethics committee may consider the general question of whether anesthesiologists “have an ethical duty to intervene regarding medical procedural decisions made by surgeons.”

Meanwhile, another device-maker last year won FDA approval to market its own version of the power morcellator. Olympus advertises that its new morcellator is equipped with a "containment device" that will supposedly stop "the escape of fluids, cells and tissue fragments."  

Even though the new Olympus morcellator is already on the market, researchers point out that there is limited data proving that the containment bags actually work at preventing the spread of cancer cells. Researchers used morcellators equipped with containment bags to perform surgery on 76 women last year and found that the bags leaked in seven of those patients.  

 It is perhaps for that reason that Olympus is continuing to test its morcellators on patients, despite already having FDA approval. The company is currently planning to test its power morcellators on 140 women, in a study conducted by doctors at the University of North Carolina. Noorchashm has tried to put a stop to this research, arguing that it is "critically flawed" and unethical to test the morcellator on people. 

Olympus responds that they simply want to improve on their products and keep their "commitment to continuing innovation." The practice of testing a device for safety after it has already been granted FDA approval “is common in the medical device industry,” Olympus spokesman Stephanie Sherry writes to ConsumerAffairs via email. 

Pelvic mesh

The story behind the plastic netted implant marketed as pelvic mesh or TVT mesh has some striking similarities to the morcellator. Both were cleared under the 510(K) process, and both were supposed to allow for fast operations on women's reproductive organs, the difference with mesh being that the device itself was supposed to stay implanted in the patient permanently. 

Treating women who had suffered from the common condition called pelvic organ prolapse used to require somewhat complicated gynecological surgery. Johnson & Johnson's TVT mesh was supposed to make that surgery easier when it was introduced in 2002. Ethicon sold gynecologists the mesh implant with the pitch, once again, that it allowed for minimally invasive surgery. Doctors could place the implant in the patient's organs without any cutting and a short recovery time.

Women who underwent the procedure said they were never informed of the specifics of what was actually being done to them. They said that doctors described the implant as a hammock of sorts that would gently hold their organs in place. 

In reality, as patients would later learn, mesh is a plastic implant made of rough netted material and is attached to the pelvis with trocar hooks. Company documents revealed in courtrooms described ways in which the plastic netting could cause severe pain and complications. And should patients suffer from those complications, there is little recourse, as most doctors do not know how to remove the implant.

It took the complaints of thousands of patients describing unbearable pain, destroyed sex lives and other issues to get the FDA to reevaluate. Finally, in 2011, the FDA released a warning that complications from mesh used to treat pelvic organ prolapse were "not rare” after all, and they re-classified the device as high-risk.

Ethicon opted to stop selling mesh for pelvic organ prolapse the following year, though it never recalled the product, and Johnson & Johnson and others still sell mesh to treat other gynecological or urological conditions, such as incontinence caused from giving birth. For many patients, the new federal warnings were too little and too late. Doctors had been treating pelvic organ prolapse with Johnson & Johnson's mesh for nearly a decade before the FDA revised its stance on the device.

The regulators’ about-face opened the floodgates to personal injury attorneys, who put out aggressive advertising campaigns to find the mesh patients who had suffered complications. An estimated 54,000 women have filed lawsuits against Johnson & Johnson in the United States, and lawsuits against other mesh manufacturers brings that total to over 127,000, making mesh lawsuits the largest type of personal injury litigation since the asbestos lawsuits, according to Reuters.

So many women have filed lawsuits and have sought surgeries to have the mesh removed that a new cottage industry has developed in which medical lenders pay for plaintiffs’ mesh removal surgery upfront. The lenders then demand a stake of the financial reward should the patient secure a financial settlement. Patients who won mesh settlements describe being shocked to find their money gutted by medical liens, as Reuters reported in 2015. Attorneys have also reportedly been pressuring their clients to accept low settlement offers. 

Litigation against Johnson & Johnson isn’t limited to the United States. In Australia, where approximately 700 women have joined a class action lawsuit against Johnson & Johnson, public officials and news media have given much more attention to complaints about the product. One lawmaker in Australia said that pelvic mesh is “the biggest medical scandal for Australian women since thalidomide in the 1950s and 1960s, when kids were born without arms and legs.”

According to testimony against Johnson & Johnson in the Australian courts, one of the company’s implanting physicians admitted that he would never perform the mesh procedure on his own wife. Salespeople reportedly incentivized doctors to perform the procedure by giving them Lamborghinis and ski trips to the Swiss Alps. Surgeons were also told, according to the court testimony, that they could insert four mesh devices “before lunch,” which would earn them $10,000 in a single morning.

Johnson & Johnson responded to the Austrian news media in a statement this month that though it could not comment on documents used in litigation, "we have confidence in the safety and efficacy of these mesh products, they are backed by scientific research."

Talc

Smooth, absorbent talcum powder has for decades been marketed as an all-purpose hygiene product for both men and women of every age. Talc is present not just in baby powder but in makeup, medicine tablets and even food. But consumers in recent years have raised concerns that some cosmetic-grade talc may be contaminated with asbestos. Regulators banned the use of asbestos in cosmetic-grade talc in 1973, but cosmetics companies are not required to have their products independently tested by the FDA. 

The FDA finally tested a selection of talc-based cosmetic products and in 2012 reported finding no traces of asbestos. Even then, the FDA warned, “the results were limited” because only four talc suppliers agreed to submit samples for testing. 

Independently of asbestos concerns, questions of whether talc itself could cause ovarian tumors have been around since the 1980s, when Harvard researcher Dr. Daniel Cramer began reporting a link between talc use for feminine hygiene and ovarian cancer. The FDA maintains that research about the dangers of daily use is inconclusive. 

Regardless, an estimated 5,000 people have sued Johnson & Johnson over its marketing of talcum powder.  The women suing say that they developed ovarian cancer after using talc daily and argue that the company knew of a link between ovarian cancer and talc use for decades. Johnson & Johnson has already had to pay out a total of $307.6 million in damages to plaintiffs who won their cases. On August 21, jurors shattered that record with their $417 million judgement to Eve Echeverria. 

“Ms. Echeverria is dying from this ovarian cancer," her attorney told CNBC, "and she said to me all she wanted to do was to help the other women throughout the whole country who have ovarian cancer for using Johnson & Johnson for 20 and 30 years."  

 Johnson & Johnson has pledged to appeal the verdict, as it has previous cases. The company has not yet returned inquiries from ConsumerAffairs about whether it is reevaluating its overall approach to gynecological health. 

In response to the litigation, the company launched its own website to defend the safety of talcum powder. “Multiple scientific and regulatory reviews have determined that talc is safe for use in cosmetic products and the labeling on Johnson’s Baby Powder is appropriate,” Johnson & Johnson says in a statement. 

The U.S. Food and Drug Administration (FDA) has approved a new gene therapy that may be able to treat, or even cure, a pervasive form of childhood cancer.

The approval allows for Kymriah -- the name that the cell-based gene therapy will be sold under -- to be used by children and other young patients up to the age of 25 who suffer from B-cell precursor acute lymphoblastic leukemia (ALL). The approval extends to forms of the disease that are refractory or in second or later relapse. FDA Commissioner Scott Gottlieb says that the new treatment method is a game-changer that can help save countless lives.

“We’re entering a new frontier in medical innovation with the ability to reprogram a patient’s own cells to attack a deadly cancer,” Gottlieb said in a statement. “New technologies such as gene and cell therapies hold out the potential to transform medicine and create an inflection point in our ability to treat and even cure many intractable illnesses.”

Promising treatment

Unlike many other therapies, Kymriah works by genetically modifying a patient’s own T cells to fight off disease. The T cells are collected by researchers and sent to a manufacturing center where they are modified to include a new gene that targets and kills leukemia cells. After being altered, the cells are sent back and infused in the patient where they go to work.

The treatment could prove to be monumentally important in fighting ALL, the most common form childhood cancer which affects a patient’s bone marrow and blood. The National Cancer Institute says that approximately 3,100 patients under the age of 20 are diagnosed with the disease ever year.

The FDA says that Kymriah will only be intended for patients who have not responded well to initial treatments or who have suffered a relapse, which occurs an estimated 15-20% of the time.

“Kymriah is a first-of-its-kind treatment approach that fills an important unmet need for children and young adults with this serious disease,” said Dr. Peter Marks, director of the FDA’s Center for Biologics Evaluation and Research (CBER). “Not only does Kymriah provide these patients with a new treatment option where very limited options existed, but a treatment option that has shown promising remission and survival rates in clinical trials.”

Costs and side effects

Despite its great promise, the FDA warns that Kymriah does have the potential for severe side effects. Experts say it could lead to high fever, flu-like symptoms, and neurological events that can be life-threatening.

Other serious side effects include infection, acute kidney injury, and hypoxia, which may appear within the first three weeks of infusion. The FDA is requiring hospitals and clinics to be specially certified in order to use the treatment.

Another major drawback of Kymriah may be its cost. Bloomberg cites analysts as saying that the treatment could cost $500,000 or more, though the Switzerland-based company producing the treatment did say that the U.S. government would only need to pay for the drug if patients responded to treatment by the end of their first month.

Procter and Gamble, the world's largest consumer products company, says it will start disclosing all of the fragrance ingredients in its products, a move that activists say will set a new precedent for the cosmetics industry.

Thousands of synthetic chemicals are used to create modern-day fragrances for everyday products from tampons to detergent. For decades, manufacturers have kept fragrance ingredients secret, even those linked to allergies and other serious health issues like cancer and birth defects.

“This is a major victory for public health,” said Erin Switalski, executive director at Women’s Voices for the Earth (WVE). “People need to know if the products they bring into their homes contain powerful allergens, or synthetic musks linked to breast cancer, or known hormone distruptors like phthalates, all of which can be found in fragrance. This was the right move by P&G.”

Fragrance is one of the most frequently identified substances causing allergic reactions and fragrance allergy affects up to 11% of the general population. 

“Our goal is to give people information that is clear, reliable and accessible. This is another step in our sustainability journey toward enabling consumers to make informed choices,” said Kathy Fish, Chief Technology Officer at Procter & Gamble. “We want people to feel great about putting our products in their shopping baskets.”

"This changes everything"

P&G's announcement follows that of Unilever, which launched a similar disclosure policy earlier this year, but limited it specifically to personal care products. P&G’s disclosure commitment is companywide, which includes cleaning, feminine care and personal care products.

“This move by Procter and Gamble solidifies the notion that keeping ingredients a secret from consumers is simply not acceptable anymore - not in personal care products, not in cleaning products, not anywhere,” said Sarada Tangirala, WVE’s national campaigns manager. “This changes everything.”

P&G said it will expand its product ingredient list both online and through the SmartLabel app to include the fragrance ingredients in a product’s formulation above 0.01%. The company aims to achieve this goal for all products sold in North America by the end of 2019. With top brands like Tide, Tampax, Febreeze, and Olay, P&G’s commitment will impacts millions of people nationwide.

“When we started our disclosure campaign in 2007, companies repeatedly told us that fragrance ingredients were a ‘trade secret’ and even a discussion about fragrance disclosure was simply off the table,” said Switalski. "Now more than ever, P&G has helped make it clear that not providing a detailed ingredient list will suggest that companies have something to hide,” said Switalski.

As Americans watch the ravages of Hurricane Harvey and wonder what they can do to help, there is an entire underclass of humans viewing the tragedy and wondering how to benefit from the misery.

These are the operators of scams, impersonating charities to get money or private information from well-meaning taxpayers.

The Internal Revenue Service (IRS) points out that these fraudulent schemes may involve contact by telephone, social media, e-mail or in-person solicitations.

Emails are sent out that steer recipients to bogus websites that appear to be affiliated with legitimate charitable causes. The sites frequently mimic the sites of, or use names similar to, legitimate charities, or claim to be affiliated with legitimate charities in order to con people into sending money or providing personal financial information that can be used to steal identities or financial resources.

What to do

If you want to make a disaster-related charitable donation that avoids avoid scam artists, the IRS offers the following tips:

• Be sure to donate to recognized charities.
• Be wary of charities with names that are similar to familiar or nationally known organizations. Some phony charities use names or websites that sound or look like those of respected, legitimate organizations. The IRS website has a search feature, Exempt Organizations Select Check, through which people may find qualified charities; donations to these charities may be tax-deductible.
• Don’t give out personal financial information such as Social Security numbers or credit card and bank account numbers and passwords to anyone who solicits a contribution. Scam artists may use this information to steal a donor’s identity and money.
• Never give or send cash. For security and tax record purposes, contribute by check or credit card or another way that provides documentation of the donation.
• Consult IRS Publication 526, Charitable Contributions, available on the IRS website. This free booklet describes the tax rules that apply to making legitimate tax-deductible donations. Among other things, it also provides complete details on what records to keep.

If you suspect fraud by email, visit the IRS website and search for the keywords “Report Phishing.”

More information about tax scams and schemes is available at the IRS website using the keywords “scams and schemes.” Details on available relief can be found on the disaster relief page on the IRS website.

There’s still a little time left to enjoy warm summer days, but cooler weather is right around the corner. To make sure your home is ready for winter, home improvement experts suggest staying one step ahead of Old Man Winter.

By taking care of outdoor home maintenance projects now, you’ll save yourself from having to brave the cold to tackle them later. In its blog, QuickenLoans runs down a few ways to get a head start on prepping your home for the winter months.

Here are a few home maintenance tasks to consider adding to your end-of-summer to-do list.

Clean and protect your roof

Check your roof for loose shingles and repair any that need fixing. If you find more than a handful of loose shingles, this may indicate a bigger issue. Consider getting a professional opinion.

While you’ve still got the ladder out, clean your gutters to clear out any debris that may have been created by summer rainfall and thunderstorms. To keep your roof from being pummeled by a heavy branch when it’s already covered in snow, remove any overhanging branches.

Seal gaps

Make sure the heat in your home will stay inside -- and small rodents will stay outside -- by sealing up cracks in the foundation or near windows.

To further ensure heat stays where you want it to during the winter months, have a professional come by to inspect your furnace in late August or early September.

“It may seem a tad too early, but you’re better off checking it off your in late summer than having something go wrong in the middle of January,” writes Anthony Fontana on Quicken Loans’ Zing blog. “Taking care of a small furnace problem up front can also save you money in the long run, instead of letting it snowball into a much more expensive issue.”

Clean your deck

Your deck has probably hosted its share of cookouts and stood up to the elements for many months, so it may be in need of a little TLC.

Instead of hitting it with a power washer or other high-pressure water outlet, which could potentially be damaging, Fontana suggests opting for a garden hose, soft brush and deck cleaner.

Additionally, either remove, cover, or store outdoor furniture and grills to protect them from harsh winter weather. Clear the soil out of pots and planters to keep them from cracking in the cold, and disconnect garden hoses that aren’t likely to be used during the winter.

Inspect your chimney

Chimneys should be cleaned a minimum of twice a year, experts say. Homeowners should be sure to remove soot and creosote buildup, which is extremely flammable.

Have your chimney inspected by a professional once a year, since a professional will be more adept at spotting and repairing structural damage.

If you've got an American Express credit card in your wallet, you may have a new way to pay for things.

Actually, two ways. The financial services company is rolling out Pay It Plan It, a mobile payment system that will work with eligible American Express accounts.

Pay It allows cardholders to use their American Express App to immediately pay for smaller purchases, in full, with a single tap. Plan It allows users to set up monthly payments for purchases over $100, over 24 months at a fixed fee and no interest.

Consumers can also continue to pay their bill each month the way they normally do, either in full or by making payments. Either way, they continue to rack up rewards and build credit.

The personal loan model

Matt Schulz, CreditCards.com's senior industry analyst, says the new payment system is highly transparent and credit card companies may soon be taking a cue from the retail banking industry.

"This move is clearly geared toward Millennials who have been drawn to the simplicity and transparency of personal loans," Shultz said in an email to ConsumerAffairs. "Banks desperately want to have them as customers. If this move is successful in earning American Express more business from Millennials, you can bet that other big card issuers will follow suit."

The big difference between the new payment system and a regular credit card is the difference between interest and a fee. Shultz says they may work out to being the same amount of money, but that's not the point.

"Whether they pay a little more or a little less than they otherwise would, customers simply want to better understand what they're getting into," he said.

Could help credit score

Shultz says the Pay It feature may also be helpful in raising your credit score. By facilitating multiple payments within a cycle, you keep your credit utilization down, a key step in improving your credit rating.

In fact, Kartik Mani, head of Global Consumer Lending at American Express, says the system was inspired by American Express members who like to make multiple payments throughout the month. The app, he says, just makes it easier.

August is only just coming to a close, but already consumers have their sights set on the impending holiday season.

A survey conducted by Princeton Survey Research Associates International (PRSAI) shows that 8 million U.S. adults have already made hotel reservations for the holidays, while another 6 million have purchased airline tickets for the same period, according to Bankrate.com.

Still, findings show that millions more will need to make plans soon if they want to ensure their accommodations. The researchers say that 35 million consumers anticipate that they’ll be staying in a hotel over the holidays and 31 million are planning to fly.

How to save

In the past, experts have hammered home that booking your flights early will save you money, but airfare tracker Hopper says that isn’t necessarily true. It says that the best time to buy plane tickets for Christmas is in October, while the best Thanksgiving prices will last until around Halloween.

For consumers looking to save even more, Bankrate.com suggests using a credit card that rewards holders with points/miles. Experts point out that many consumers who travel infrequently might not realize how many points/miles they have accrued just by using their credit card to pay for everyday expenses. Consumers can often redeem these rewards for hotel and airline accommodations, or for cash back, so don’t forget about them.

And, if those savings aren’t enough for you, Bankrate.com analyst Robin Saks Frankel says that consumers can also take advantage of lucrative credit card sign-up bonuses.

“This is basically free money,” the analyst says. “The best current offers are worth up to $1,000 in free travel – just for signing up for the card. You can also get other perks like free checked bags, airport lounge access, Global Entry and TSA pre-check.”

Consumers can browse some of 2017’s best credit card options by visiting Bankrate.com’s site here.

It’s important to set good habits for ourselves when we’re young, especially when it comes to staying healthy. But a recent study conducted by the American Heart Association shows that many young people, and particularly young men, are dropping the ball when it comes to regulating their cardiovascular health.

Senior study author Andrew Moran York points out that heart-related issues like high blood pressure cost the U.S. public around $110 billion in 2015, and that improving heart conditions in young people could go a long way towards reducing that burden.

"While hypertension awareness, treatment and control have improved overall since the early 2000s, all three remain worse in young adults -- those aged 18-39," he said.

Focusing on cardiovascular health

The researchers came to their conclusions after analyzing data on 41,000 people who took part in eight national health surveys between 1999 and 2014. Among the key findings, they say that:

• Only half of 6.7 million young adults with high blood pressure in 2013-2014 received treatment, while only 40% managed to lower their blood pressure to safe levels;
• Among young men, rates of awareness, treatment, and control were lower compared to young women (68.4% vs. 86% for awareness, 43.7% vs. 61.3% for treatment, and 33.7% vs. 51.8% for control); and
• Nearly 75% of young adults who had high blood pressure were obese, compared with 57% for middle-aged adults and 42% for older adults. The researchers say this indicates that young adults with high blood pressure are twice as likely to be obese.

Lead author Dr. Yiyi Zhang said that the findings highlight several shortcomings among young people when it comes to screening and managing their cardiovascular health. The researchers recommend that this demographic renew their focus on their health in order to improve outcomes.

"The first step for young adults is to have their blood pressure measured, whether in a doctor's office, pharmacy or other place in their community. Young adults with consistently high blood pressure need a link to clinical care to verify the diagnosis and receive regular monitoring and possibly treatment," said Zhang.

The full study has been published in Hypertension.

When children get injured or become ill, parents can (and often do) head straight to the web to research a potential remedy or course of action. But herbal products and other treatments not prescribed by a doctor can pose a health risk.

Still, a new report from the American Academy of Pediatrics (AAP) shows parents often try unconventional treatments -- and many don’t tell their child’s doctor about it.

Refraining from telling your child’s pediatrician about ‘complementary’ therapy use could be especially hazardous if your child is already taking traditional prescription medications, the report authors warn.

Safety concerns

Complementary and alternative medicine refers to treatments that are not considered part of traditional Western medicine, such as herbal remedies, dietary supplements, acupuncture, or homeopathy.

"The point we're making in this report is that many of our young patients are already using these [complementary] therapies," said lead author Dr. Hilary McClafferty. "And much of that use is driven by the consumer, by parents looking for additional help for their children.

"But a lot of parents are not necessarily disclosing this use to their child's pediatrician, for fear of censure or ridicule," McClafferty told HealthDay News. "That can be a problem, because while we are really excited about some of the advances in the field of complementary medicine and research, it is also important to discuss with parents the need for safety and proper use.”

What parents should know

As more parents consult Google or ask social media instead of calling their child’s doctor, therapies like these have become more widely used.

More than 1 in 10 U.S. children, and more than half of kids with chronic medical conditions, have used complementary and alternative medicine, according to federal statistics from 2012.

The researchers say it’s important for parents to know the potential risks of complementary and alternative medicines, especially if they are going to use them on their children.

Parents should know most alternative treatments are poorly regulated by the FDA because they are classified as “food” rather than a medicine. Additionally, mixing supplements with prescription medication can weaken or strengthen a prescription drug’s impact, the study authors explained.

Discuss with a doctor

While acupuncture, meditation, and yoga have a large body of evidence to support their efficacy, supplements and other complementary treatments often do not and should be discussed with a doctor, said Lorenzo Cohen, director of the integrative medicine program at MD Anderson Cancer Center.

"Discussing all this needs to be part of the standard of care in terms of dialogues between informed physicians and parents,” Cohen said. “The days are over where physicians can just say, 'Well, I don't know much about it.' They need to find out, and they need to talk about it with their patients."

The full report, “Pediatric Integrative Medicine,” has been published online in the journal Pediatrics.