BREAKING Monthly earnings rise, payroll employment falls: jobs report
The number of vacant jobs in Canada increased in February, while monthly payroll employment decreased in food services, manufacturing, and retail trade, among other sectors.
A judge formally approved a plan Friday to turn OxyContin maker Purdue Pharma into a new company no longer owned by members of the Sackler family and with its profits going to fight the opioid epidemic.
U.S. Bankruptcy Judge Robert Drain officially confirmed the reorganization Friday, more than two weeks after he announced he would do so pending two largely technical changes to the plan presented by the company and hashed out with lawyers representing those with claims against the company.
His confirmation took more than six hours to read in court earlier this month, and the written version is 159 pages long, full of reasoning that appeals courts can consider later. Several states among other parties have already appealed the decision.
The deal resolves some 3,000 lawsuits filed by state and local governments, Native American tribes, unions, hospitals and others who claimed the company's marketing of prescription opioids helped spark and continue an overdose epidemic linked to more than 500,000 deaths in the U.S. in the last two decades.
The plan will use company profits and $4.5 billion in cash and charitable assets from members of the Sackler family to pay some individual victims amounts expected to range from $3,500 to $48,000, and help fund opioid treatment and prevention programs across the U.S.
Members of the Sackler family are also required to get out of the opioid business worldwide in time.
Millions of company documents, including communications with company lawyers, are to be made public.
The changes are to take effect when the bankruptcy process is finalized; the earliest that could be is in December.
The attorneys generals from the states of Connecticut, Maryland, Washington and the District of Columbia, as well as the U.S. Bankruptcy Trustee have all announced appeals. Their chief objection is that members of the wealthy Sackler family would be granted protection from lawsuits over opioids.
For many people in recovery from opioid addictions or who have lost loved ones to overdoses, the deal is infuriating.
Ellen Isaacs, a mother whose son died from an overdose, filed court papers requesting Drain not accept the plan. At a hearing on Monday, she gave a passionate some sometimes tearful 40-minute speech on her request. Like other activists, she asserted that Sackler family members -- who have never been charged with criminal wrongdoing -- are getting away with crimes, and that politicians and courts are not doing enough to end the opioid epidemic.
"The attorneys are playing games on paper and humans are dying," she said.
Drain said the money from the settlement would help avert more deaths, even if it will come too late for Isaacs' son.
"I did not become a judge to get things wrong," he told her.
He stood by his confirmation of the plan.
At the hearing, Drain also said he would approve a request from Purdue to use nearly $7 million to start setting up the funds that will distribute settlement money to victims, government entities and others. He also, for the third year, approved a plan of incentive payments for Purdue executives if they meet certain goals.
The number of vacant jobs in Canada increased in February, while monthly payroll employment decreased in food services, manufacturing, and retail trade, among other sectors.
The Canadian Medical Association asserts the Liberals' proposed changes to capital gains taxation will put doctors' retirement savings in jeopardy, but some financial experts insist incorporated professionals are not as doomed as they say they are.
A West Virginia father is getting some sense of closure after authorities found the remains of his young daughter and her mother following a deathbed confession from the man believed to have fatally shot them nearly two decades ago.
For centuries, people have wondered what, if anything, might be lurking beneath the surface of Loch Ness in Scotland. When Canadian couple Parry Malm and Shannon Wiseman visited the Scottish highlands earlier this month with their two children, they didn’t expect to become part of the mystery.
Recent injected drugs like Wegovy and its predecessor, the diabetes medication Ozempic, are reshaping the health and fitness industries.
Two military horses that bolted and ran miles through the streets of London after being spooked by construction noise and tossing their riders were in a serious condition and required operations, a British government official said Thursday.
Mounties in Nanaimo, B.C., say two late-night revellers are lucky their allegedly drunken antics weren't reported to police after security cameras captured the men trying to steal a heavy sign from a downtown business.
It's no secret that spring can be a tumultuous time for Canadian weather, and as an unseasonably mild El Nino winter gives way to summer, there's bound to be a few swings in temperature that seem out of the ordinary. From Ontario to the Atlantic, though, this week is about to feel a little erratic.
The oldest living former major leaguer, Art Schallock turns 100 on Thursday and is being celebrated in the Bay Area and beyond as the milestone approaches.
A property tax bill is perplexing a small townhouse community in Fergus, Ont.
When identical twin sisters Kim and Michelle Krezonoski were invited to compete against some of the world’s most elite female runners at last week’s Boston Marathon, they were in disbelief.
The giant stone statues guarding the Lions Gate Bridge have been dressed in custom Vancouver Canucks jerseys as the NHL playoffs get underway.
A local Oilers fan is hoping to see his team cut through the postseason, so he can cut his hair.
A family from Laval, Que. is looking for answers... and their father's body. He died on vacation in Cuba and authorities sent someone else's body back to Canada.
A former educational assistant is calling attention to the rising violence in Alberta's classrooms.
The federal government says its plan to increase taxes on capital gains is aimed at wealthy Canadians to achieve “tax fairness.”
At 6'8" and 350 pounds, there is nothing typical about UBC offensive lineman Giovanni Manu, who was born in Tonga and went to high school in Pitt Meadows.
Kevin the cat has been reunited with his family after enduring a harrowing three-day ordeal while lost at Toronto Pearson International Airport earlier this week.