Day: March 9, 2022

A bipartisan group of lawmakers has written a letter asking the Department of Justice to determine whether online retailer Amazon engaged in obstruction of Congress during an investigation of the company’s competitive practices. 

The letter said the company had “engaged in a pattern and practice of misleading conduct” that suggested it had sought to influence or obstruct an investigation into how it operates. 

The House Judiciary Committee conducted a 16-month probe into how Amazon, Apple, Google and Facebook operated. 

During the investigation, lawmakers focused on Amazon’s use of private-label products and collection of third-party data. 

Amazon allegedly copied popular products in India and then manipulated search results to increase the sales of its own products, Reuters reported. 

The committee’s letter to DOJ alleges Amazon made untrue or misleading statements when asked about those practices. It also said Amazon refused to provide evidence that would “either corroborate its claims or correct the record,” according to the 24-page letter. 

“It appears to have done so to conceal the truth about its use of third-party sellers’ data to advantage its private-label business and its preferencing of private-label products in search results — subjects of the Committee’s investigation,” according to the letter, which was signed by House Judiciary Committee Chair Jerrold Nadler, House Antitrust Subcommittee Chair David Cicilline, and Democratic and Republican committee members.  

“As a result, we have no choice but to refer this matter to the Department of Justice to investigate whether Amazon and its executives obstructed Congress in violation of applicable federal law,” the letter added. 

Amazon told CNBC that “there’s no factual basis for this, as demonstrated in the huge volume of information we’ve provided over several years of good faith cooperation with this investigation.” 

When Amazon founder Jeff Bezos testified to the committee in July 2020, he said the company prevents Amazon employees from using seller data but could not say it had never happened. 

Lawmakers said investigations by news organizations like Reuters and The Wall Street Journal contradicted Bezos’ testimony, as well as testimony of other Amazon employees. 

“Amazon attempted to clean up the inaccurate testimony through ever-shifting explanations of its internal policies and denials of the investigative reports,” the lawmakers said. “The committee uncovered evidence from former Amazon employees, and former and current sellers, that corroborated the reports’ claims.” 

“After Amazon was caught in a lie and repeated misrepresentations, it stonewalled the committee’s efforts to uncover the truth,” the letter said.  

Some information in this report came from The Associated Press and Reuters. 

 
…

The World Health Organization expressed concern Wednesday that many countries are drastically reducing COVID-19 testing, inhibiting the ability of public health professionals to monitor where the coronavirus is, how it’s spreading and how it’s evolving.

During a briefing at agency headquarters in Geneva, WHO Director-General Tedros Adhanom Ghebreyesus said that while cases and deaths were declining globally and many countries had lifted restrictions, the pandemic was far from over, “and it will not be over anywhere until it’s over everywhere.”

Tedros said the WHO on Wednesday published new guidelines on self-testing for COVID-19 and recommended that self-tests be offered in addition to professionally administered testing services. He said evidence showed that users can reliably and accurately self-test, and that self-testing may reduce inequalities in testing access.

The WHO chief said he hoped the new guidance would also help increase access to testing, which is too expensive for many low-income countries, where those tools could play an important role in expanding testing.

Tedros also said the agency and its partners in the ACT Accelerator grouping — part of the WHO’s COVAX initiative, which has focused on equitable access to vaccines globally — were seeking to raise funds “to ensure that all countries that need self-tests will be able to receive them as quickly as possible.”

Regarding the situation in Ukraine, Tedros said the WHO had so far delivered 81 tons of supplies to the country and was establishing a pipeline of supplies for health facilities throughout Ukraine.

He said Tuesday that the agency had delivered five tons of medical supplies to Kyiv to support surgical care for 150 trauma patients, and other supplies to manage a range of health conditions for 45,000 people for a month.

Tedros said the WHO “continues to call on the Russian Federation to commit to a peaceful resolution to this crisis, and to allow safe, unimpeded access to humanitarian assistance for those in need.”
…

A man who received the first heart transplant from a pig two months ago has died, the University of Maryland Medical Center said Wednesday. 

Doctors did not say the specific reason David Bennett, 57, died Tuesday, only saying his condition had been worsening over the past several days. 

“We are grateful for every innovative moment, every crazy dream, every sleepless night that went into this historic effort,” Bennett’s son, David Bennett Jr., said in a statement released by the University of Maryland School of Medicine. “We hope this story can be the beginning of hope and not the end.” 

Prior to the January 7 transplant, Bennett had been in poor health and was ineligible for a human heart. 

Organ transplants from animals — xenotransplantation — have largely failed because the human body rejects them almost immediately, but in this case, the pig had been genetically modified with human genes in the hope of delaying rejection.  

At first, things seemed to be going well for Bennett, and last month, the hospital released a video of him watching the Super Bowl from his hospital bed. 

“We are devastated by the loss of Mr. Bennett. He proved to be a brave and noble patient who fought all the way to the end,” Dr. Bartley Griffith, who performed the surgery at the Baltimore hospital, said in a statement. 

Bennett lived longer than one notable case in 1984 when a baboon heart was transplanted to a baby. The baby lived 21 days. 

“We have gained invaluable insights learning that the genetically modified pig heart can function well within the human body while the immune system is adequately suppressed,” said Dr. Muhammad M. Mohiuddin, professor of surgery and scientific director of the Cardiac Xenotransplantation Program at University of Maryland School of Medicine. “We remain optimistic and plan on continuing our work in future clinical trials.”

More than 106,000 people are on the organ donation waiting list in the United States. Last year, more than 41,000 transplants were performed, and of those, 3,800 were heart transplants. 

Some information in this report comes from The Associated Press. 

 
…