IN BRIEF

Clark County judge dismisses hormone treatment lawsuit

Clark County District Judge James Bixler on Wednesday dismissed a lawsuit the attorney general's office filed against major drug companies over allegations that hormone treatments damaged the health of Nevada women.

However, the case never reached substantive issues, because Bixler agreed with defendants Wyeth Pharmaceuticals, Pfizer Inc. and Pharmacia & Upjohn Co. that Nevada's four-year statute of limitations had expired when the lawsuit was filed in November 2008.

The judge ruled that the state waited too long to file the lawsuit. Key to the decision was the determination of when the plaintiff first should have known about problems with the hormone treatment drugs and thus when the statute of limitations started ticking.

Nevada was the first of multiple states to file a lawsuit over the marketing of hormone therapy drugs, but some states don't have a statute of limitations on these claims.

The drug companies were accused of selling hormone replacement therapy drugs, including Premarin, Cycrin and Prempro, to women coping with menopause symptoms, such as mood swings, hot flashes and night sweats.

The lawsuit, filed by attorney Peter Wetherall in cooperation with the attorney general's office, claimed that the hormone treatments posed "substantial health risk with little or no corresponding benefit." It mentioned risks including breast and ovarian cancer, heart attacks, strokes and auto-immune diseases.

The state claimed the drug companies violated the Nevada Deceptive Trade Practices Act and sought damages and restitution.

DALLAS

American Airlines union
seeks first step to strike

The union representing ground workers at American Airlines wants to take a big step toward a strike against the nation's second-largest airline.

The Transport Workers Union said Wednesday it will ask federal mediators to let the employees walk away from contract talks if there is no deal by March 8.

If federal mediators agree, it could start the countdown toward a strike this spring. The president or Congress can block strikes, which have become very rare in the airline industry.

American Airlines spokeswoman Missy Latham said talk of ending mediation was premature, and that a ruling freeing workers to strike "is also not up to the union."

The union represents 28,000 workers at American Airlines and American Eagle, including mechanics and bag handlers. One of the union's smaller groups has been negotiating since 2006 and the rest since 2007.

NEW YORK

Walgreen agrees to purchase Duane Reade for $1.08 billion

Walgreen Co. said Wednesday it has agreed to buy the drugstore operator Duane Reade in a move that will more than quadruple the number of stores it has in the New York City metro area.

Walgreen, the nation's biggest drugstore operator, said it would pay about $623 million for Duane Reade Holdings Inc., which is the biggest drugstore chain in the city. Including $457 million in debt held by Duane Reade, the transaction is valued at $1.08 billion.

Duane Reade, which has been operating in New York for 50 years, is owned by a group that includes affiliates of the buyout firm Oak Hill Capital Partners. Walgreen said Duane Reade's sales totaled about $1.8 billion in 2009.

The deal, which requires regulatory approval, would include all 257 Duane Reade stores, along with the corporate office and two distribution centers. Most of those stores are in Manhattan, where Walgreen currently has 13 stores.

Walgreen, based in Deerfield, Ill., described the deal as its biggest retail acquisition ever. It operates 70 stores in the New York area and had 7,162 stores overall as of Jan. 31. The company opened a new store in Times Square in 2008, but said it would take many years to match the amount of stores and the quality locations Duane Reade already has.

WASHINGTON

Government mortgage plan aids 12 percent of borrowers

The government's mortgage relief plan has helped only about 12 percent of borrowers who signed up since President Barack Obama announced the program a year ago.

The Treasury Department said Wednesday that as of last month, about 116,000 homeowners had completed the application process and had their loan payments reduced permanently. That compares with more than 1 million homeowners who started the process.

More than 61,000 homeowners have dropped out so far, either because they failed to make payments or didn't return the necessary paperwork. And hundreds of thousands more are likely to fall out soon, predicts Alan White, a law professor at Valparaiso University.

"I would say it's a complete failure at this point," White said.

Treasury officials, however, say the program is on track. The plan "is doing the job it was designed to do," said Phyllis Caldwell, chief of the Treasury's homeownership preservation office. "Struggling families are receiving payment relief and the housing market is showing signs of stabilization."

SAN FRANCISCO

Google donates $2 million
to Wikipedia for expansion

Google Inc., the Internet's most profitable company, is giving $2 million to support Wikipedia, a volunteer-driven reference tool that has emerged as one of the Web's most-read sites.

The donation announced Wednesday matches the largest grant made so far to Wikimedia Foundation, the nonprofit group that oversees the 7-year-old Wikipedia. Ebay founder Pierre Omidyar also donated $2 million to Wikimedia six months ago through one of his investment arms.

The latest largesse has catapulted Wikimedia beyond its $10.6 million revenue target for its fiscal year ending in June. That goal had looked ambitious, given that it represented an increase of more than 20 percent from $8.7 million a year earlier.

But the worst recession since World War II evidently didn't dampen support for the Internet's most popular encyclopedia, which has more than 14 million entries written and edited by some 100,000 unpaid contributors in about 270 languages.

Wikimedia, which gets most of its revenue from donations, has collected contributions from more than 240,000 individuals so far this fiscal year .

The outpouring has allowed Wikipedia to expand while keeping its Web site commercial free, spokesman Jay Walsh said. "We intend to keep it that way, too."