Industry’s ties to doctors, top hospitals at $3.5B in payments and benefits
WASHINGTON — From research grants to travel junkets, drug and medical device companies paid doctors and leading hospitals billions of dollars last year, the government disclosed Tuesday in a new effort to spotlight potential ethical conflicts in medicine.
The value of industry payments and other financial benefits totaled nearly $3.5 billion in the five-month period from August through December 2013, according to the Centers for Medicare and Medicaid Services, which released the data.
The massive trove of information named companies and many of the recipients. Also listed were types of payments, with details down to travel destinations. Some 546,000 clinicians and 1,360 teaching hospitals received benefits.
It’s part of a new initiative called Open Payments, required by President Barack Obama’s health care law. It was intended to allow patients to easily look up their own doctors online, but that functionality isn’t fully developed. In future years, the information will cover a full 12 months and will be easier to search, officials said.
Protests get nonstop coverage in Hong Kong, but not a single image in China’s media
BEIJING — China’s government has cut off news about Hong Kong’s pro-democracy protests to the rest of the country, a clampdown so thorough that no image of the rallies has appeared in state-controlled media, and at least one man has been detained for reposting accounts of the events.
By contrast, media in semiautonomous Hong Kong have been broadcasting nonstop about the crowds, showing unarmed students fending off tear gas and pepper spray with umbrellas as they call for more representative democracy in the former British colony.
US signs pact for troops to stay in Afghanistan
WASHINGTON — After lengthy delays, U.S. and Afghan officials signed a security pact Tuesday to keep American troops in Afghanistan beyond year’s end, aiming to prevent the country from descending into the kind of chaos that has plagued Iraq following the Pentagon’s withdrawal.
While President Barack Obama has touted the Afghan accord as crucial to protecting progress in the fight against al-Qaida, he’s also insisted that had he reached a similar pact with Iraq, it would have done little to stop the rise of the Islamic State militants now wreaking havoc there and in neighboring Syria.
Stocks slip, leaving S&P 500 down for September
NEW YORK — A suddenly stormy month on the stock market came to a quiet end on Tuesday. Major indexes drifted to a slight loss, leaving the Standard &Poor’s 500 down 1.6 percent for September, its third monthly drop this year.
The market spent Tuesday wavering between minor gains and losses, but there were big moves beneath the surface. Crude oil prices plunged, dragging down Chevron and other oil and gas companies. Ford Motor fell after cutting its profit forecast, while eBay jumped after announcing plans to spin off PayPal.
The Dow Jones industrial average fell 28.32 points, or 0.2 percent, to 17,042.90. The S&P 500 slipped 5.51 points, or 0.3 percent, to 1,972.29. The Nasdaq composite lost 12.46 points, also 0.3 percent, to 4,493.39.
By wire sources