The US Court of Appeals for the Eighth Circuit reinstated Monday almost 6,000 products liability lawsuits filed against 3M in relation to a surgical device that was meant to keep patients warm but instead allegedly caused them to develop infections. 3M’s Bair Hugger device is a convective patient-warming device that is used during surgery to [...]

President Andrzej Duda signed a bill on Saturday that severely restricts restitution and compensation for people whose properties were seized by Nazi occupiers, and expropriated during the country’s communist era. The bill was passed by the Polish parliament on Thursday and will mostly affect Jews and their descendants who are the majority whose properties were [...]

Royal Dutch Shell (Shell), one of the world’s six “supermajor” oil companies, on Wednesday announced it will pay N 45.9 billion (naira) (US $111.6 million) in settling a decades-long legal dispute concerning an oil spill that occurred during the Biafran-Nigerian civil war. A coalition of ten Ogoni community members led by Chief Isaac Agbara in [...]

The US Supreme Court issued an emergency order on Thursday blocking part of New York’s eviction moratorium aimed at protecting renters from eviction during the COVID-19 pandemic. As a result of the emergency order, thousands of renters will potentially face eviction. The emergency order will remove the “self-attestation” ability for renters, which previously allowed renters [...]

The Canadian government on Friday announced that it will resettle 20,000 vulnerable Afghans facing threats from the Taliban and being forced to flee as Taliban edges closer to assuming total control of Afghanistan. The Immigration Refugees and Citizenship Canada (IRCC) stated that the government is deeply concerned about the deteriorating situation in Afghanistan and assured [...]

The Washington Supreme Court on Thursday unanimously held that a homeless person’s vehicle automatically qualifies as a homestead without the need for a declaration and that the impoundment of that vehicle and associated costs constitute excessive fines—a violation of the Eighth Amendment to the US Constitution. The case involves Steven Gregory Long, a 56-year-old Native [...]

The US Supreme Court on Thursday denied an application for an emergency writ of injunction against Indiana University’s COVID-19 vaccine mandate, upholding the rulings of the two lower courts. Justice Amy Coney Barrett denied the application without seeking response from the university or the state and without referring it for a vote to the full Court. [...]

The lower house of Poland’s parliament voted 228-216 to narrowly pass a media reform legislation on Wednesday that the US Department of State fears will “significantly weaken the media environment the Polish people have worked so long to build.” Stating that he is “deeply troubled” by the legislation, Secretary of State Antony Blinken emphasised the importance of media freedom [...]

The California Department of Public Health (CDPH) issued a public health order on Wednesday requiring all school staff to show proof of full vaccination or in the alternative submit themselves for COVID-19 testing at least once a week. The order applies to all public and private schools, including K-12 schools, but does not apply to [...]

Myanmar’s armed forces (the Tatmadaw) has carried out 252 attacks on healthcare workers since the Tatmadaw illegally seized control of the country in a coup d’état in February, according to a report published on Tuesday. Violence Against or Obstruction of Health Care in Myanmar, published by Safeguarding Health in Conflict Coalition, identified 252 reported incidents involving [...]