United States (KaiserHealth) – While squabbles over the rules for approving new medical devices rarely attract much attention outside the insular world of manufacturers, regulators and medical professions, a fight is brewing that could have a major impact on efforts to control health-care spending.

The device industry has launched an aggressive campaign to avoid tighter Food and Drug Administration rules that would help generate the information needed to show whether newer devices are actually superior to the ones they replace. The latest devices – from heart valves and defibrillators to artificial knees and hips – are usually significantly more expensive than older devices, and the intense marketing surrounding the introduction of new devices has become a major driver of rising health care costs.

Many medical specialists say tighter rules are needed to ensure newer devices are safe and effective, which could help hold down costs. “Better regulation of medical devices has the potential to reduce health care costs,” said Steve Nissen, chairman of cardiovascular medicine at the Cleveland Clinic. “New devices are often more complex and expensive than existing products, but may not offer any improvements in health outcomes. The current regulatory approach allows these devices to reach the market with little or no clinical data.”

“Requiring evidence of benefit of effectiveness for patients before device approval would prevent billions of dollars from being spent on technologies that are not helpful for patients and are even harmful,” said Rita Redberg, editor of the Archives of Internal Medicine and a cardiologist at the University of California, San Francisco. “There are many examples, such as vertebroplasty and kyphoplasty for back pain [compression fractures], on which Medicare spends approximately $1 billion annually. After they were FDA-approved, randomized clinical trials showed they were no more effective than a sham procedure in relieving symptoms.”

Despite the cry for tighter rules, think tanks funded by industry in recent weeks have released several studies claiming that the FDA is standing in the way of improved devices getting to market. Congress is holding hearings to investigate the issue. And a third of the members of the House has signed a letter calling for legislation that would roll back a small excise tax that proponents claim is choking off “innovation.”

The 2.3 percent tax projected to generate $20 billion over the coming decade was part of the health care reform law and was similar to excise taxes slapped on the drug and insurance industries, which have not launched similar campaigns. All three industries are among the most profitable in America.

The controversy has important regional political significance because many of the device manufacturers are major employers in the Midwest – especially in Minnesota, Ohio, and Indiana. With the backing of Midwestern lawmakers, the industry is fighting back. Rep. Erik Paulsen, R-Minn., whose district abuts the headquarters of industry giant Medtronic, last week released a letter with 154 co-signers, including four Democrats, that called for repealing the $2 billion-a-year tax.

“Device manufacturers will have to cut R&D or may be forced to lay off employees due to this disastrous tax,” the letter said.

Proponents of the industry warn that what they describe as hostile government action could lead to a loss of jobs. Moreover, some manufacturers claim that they are looking overseas for a more permissive regulatory environment. There are over 8,000 medical device companies in the U.S.; they generated about $136 billion in sales and employed over 422,000 last year, according to industry officials.

While the industry did better than the economy as a whole through the recession, losing only 1.1 percent of its jobs compared with nearly 5 percent of all manufacturing workers, its job performance lagged behind the rest of the health-care economy, which added employment throughout the downturn.

Two years ago, the medical device industry, which manufactures everything from heart valves to ace bandages, came under tougher scrutiny. The FDA had become more aggressive overseeing the industry in response to criticism that it had repeatedly caved to corporate and political pressure when approving new products. After health-care reformers targeted the industry for higher taxes to help pay for covering the uninsured, Democratic leaders in Congress asked the prestigious Institute of Medicine (IOM) to convene a blue-ribbon panel to determine if the industry needed tougher regulations to ensure the safety and effectiveness of its products. With the IOM’s final report due later this month, the industry is mounting a major public relations offensive to blunt calls for stronger oversight.

The Institute for Health Technology Studies, which is primarily funded by the industry, late last month released an industry survey showing American companies are increasingly going to Europe to get new devices approved. Industry executives also claimed that the FDA in the last few years has arbitrarily toughened its standards for new devices that are similar to products already on the market. In the past, those look-alike products usually received a less rigorous review than brand new medical innovations.

“As the FDA considers regulatory revisions, what’s at stake is the ability of companies to attract investors in order to continue developing innovative, life-saving products and sustaining American competitiveness in the global marketplace,” said John Linehan, a professor of biomedical engineering at Northwestern University and lead author of the survey.

Paulsen, the Minnesota lawmaker, cited the example of Xtent, a Menlo Park, Calif., device maker that tried to gain approval to start a U.S. clinical trial for its coronary stent. Surgeons had already inserted the company’s stent in hundreds of European patients. When the FDA refused to consider data from the European experiences and insisted on a prospective clinical trial, the company closed its doors and sold the technology to foreign investors.

Last week, the House Oversight and Government Reform Committee called in the FDA’s top device regulator to explain the changes underway at the agency, which Republican members claimed had gone too far. “In some cases, the conveyor belt for medical devices has come to a grinding halt,” charged Rep. Trey Gowdy, R-SC., who chairs the health subcommittee.

Jeffrey Shuren, a lawyer and physician who 18 months ago replaced the previous head of the troubled Center for Devices and Radiological Health at FDA, promised to “do a far better job to make the process more efficient without compromising our standards for safety and efficacy.”

Earlier this year, the FDA proposed new rules that would give companies more certainty about what would be expected from them when bringing new products to the agency. But it postponed consideration of any major changes in the oversight process pending the IOM report, which could propose companies do more clinical trials proving efficacy for follow-on devices.

The current rules are a product of the 1976 law that ushered in the modern era of medical device regulation. They require any new device whose failure would pose a serious risk to public health to go through rigorous clinical trial testing in humans for both safety and effectiveness before going on the market. But the law also set up a regulatory scheme, known as the 510(k) process, which allows follow-on devices deemed substantially similar to something already on the market to get approved without the same level of testing. Regulators have discretionary power to order more tests.

The vast majority of new devices use the follow-on process, even though their manufacturers often claim superior performance to the older models and charge accordingly. The result is a lack of scientific data for making those comparisons, which leaves Medicare, private insurers and physicians in the dark as to their relative worth.

The regulatory framework for potentially life-saving devices differs from drugs, where follow-on products – say, the four or fifth statin to come to market for lowering cholesterol – must still go through rigorous clinical trial testing. While that doesn’t meet the gold standard of head-to-head comparisons between competing products, at least that gives medical analysts sufficient information to know if one drug is significantly better or worse than another product in the same class.

Safety issues can arise when there are no clinical trials for follow-on devices. And that also contributes to rising health care spending, since it can result in costly recalls or even follow-on operations to replace faulty devices. The updated devices often change materials or tweak the engineering, which can alter their performance once put in the body or deployed in health care settings.

A study published earlier this year in Archives of Internal Medicine found that of 113 major product recalls between 2005 and 2009, only’ percent had gone through the more rigorous clinical trial testing required for new products, while 71 percent had used the follow-on process. There had been only 49 major recalls in the prior five years.

“Yes, the FDA’s getting tougher and it’s long overdue,” said the study’s lead author, Diana Zuckerman, executive director of the National Research Center for Women and Families. “Too many things were sailing through without clear evidence they were safe and effective.”

She cited last December’s recall of 359 million glucose test strips manufactured by Abbott Laboratories, whose malfunction could give diabetics false readings and lead to under or over-medication. Last week Redberg of UCSF told the oversight subcommittee to reject calls for speeding up the regulatory review process in the name of fostering greater innovation. She cited a 2009 Government Accountability Office report that found that a majority of high-risk devices do not go through clinical trial testing prior to marketing. “Only high-quality clinical trials can assure safety and effectiveness, especially when it comes to high risk devices that are used with invasive procedures,” she said.

– Provided by Kaiser Health News.

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San’aa, Yemen (TML) – The pitched battles have given way to occasional gun and mortar fire. Stores have re-opened, even if water and electricity remain in short supply. The city is bristling with troops, but many of them have flowers sprouting out of their guns, courtesy of the joyous opposition protestors.

But even with its long-serving president, Ali Abdullah Saleh, out of the country, the future of Yemen remains as murky as ever.

After repeatedly turning down offers to step down as part of a negotiated solution with the opposition, Saleh ended up leaving on a stretcher after he was wounded in a rocket attack on his compound over the weekend. He leaves behind a country in disarray, with a figurehead vice president officially in charge while powerful tribes and Saleh’s sons and nephews vie for power and Al-Qa’ida lurks in the background. The economy is paralyzed.

“We are looking at an extreme political vacuum. We don’t know exactly how long his sons and nephews can stay in control of security forces,” Christian Koch, director of the international studies program at the Gulf Research Center told The Media Line. “There are too many questions marks around. We’re looking for a period of continued volatility.”

A lot is at stake in the poor, perpetually unstable country. Astride a major route of world oil, Yemen risks devolve into a failed state and a base for Islamic radicals much like Afghanistan and Somalia. Yemen’s Gulf neighbors, together with the U.S., struggled to force Saleh out of office and see an orderly transition to a new government.

Saleh was a victim of a strategy to take on the tribal groups, led by the Hashis, which had emerged as the biggest challenge to his continued rule. Two weeks ago, he dispatched his troops to besiege the Al-Ahmar family compound, setting off the worst violence Sana’a had seen since protests against Saleh’s rule erupted in January..

Along with leaving more than 200 dead and bringing the city to a standstill, the violence touched the president himself on Friday when a mosque in the presidential compound was hit — probably by a mortar shell. Not only was Saleh wounded seriously enough for him to be flown out of the country, but the attack also injured the prime minister, two deputy prime ministers and the speakers of both parliamentary chambers, all of whom are now being treated in the Saudi capital of Riyadh.

For now, Yemen is formally under the rule of Abd-Rabbu Mansour Hadi. But the real center of governmental power lies with the Saleh family, according to Jeb Boone, who is managing editor of The Yemen Times. They could employ that to ensure the president’s return or take over the country themselves. Saleh briefly addressed the nation after the attack but didn’t say he was relinquishing the power he has clung to tenaciously over the course of the unrest.

“His sons, who are military commanders of the Republican Guard and central security, are still in the country,” Boone told The Media Line. “If he [Saleh] wanted to somehow secure his return through his sons as military commanders, I think they would have the ability to do that.”

Two other contenders for power are Hamid Al-Ahmar, a millionaire businessmen and leader of the Hasid tribe. He is believed to have connections with Al-Qa’ida. Another is General Ali Mohsen who broke publicly with Saleh, his half-brother, sided with the anti-government opposition. Subsequently, he remained aloof from the fighting, but many Yemenis believe it was his forces that hit the presidential mosque, and not those of Al-Ahmar.

In the remote regions of Yemen, other tribes have asserted their authority at the expense of the government. Koch of the Gulf Research Center said he is pretty confident that with Saleh gone they would be prepared to recognize the authority of the central government again.

“None of the tribes want to see the disintegration of the state – it doesn’t serve their interests,” Koch said. “Most of them are interested in trying to find a working arrangement where their interests are respected.”

The political arena, however, won’t be left entirely to domestic players. The U.S. and, more importantly neighboring Saudi Arabia, are determined to ensure that stability returns to Yemen. The Saudis already have a trump card with Saleh and many of his top aides and family now in their sovereign territory.

Saudi Arabia and the other members of the Gulf Cooperation Council (GCC) have been running scared by the Arab Spring and its threat to the region’s long-standing rulers. The GCC was quick to smother the only protests to break out among a member nation, Bahrain, by sending in troops.

Much bigger and more chaotic than Bahrain, a military option isn’t likely in Yemen, Abdelkhaleq Abdalla, professor of political science at Emirates University in Dubai, told The Media Line.

“I don’t think the Saudis will need to send any troops. That’s not really an option, but the Saudis and the GCC will never give up in Yemen,” he said. “It’s in their backyard and its a strategic place. Whatever happens in Yemen is of immediate concern of the GCC capitals. They will do everything possible to restore some kind of normalcy with the help of America, Europe and others.”

Analysts give relatively short shift to the Al-Qa’ida threat, which has been the biggest concern of the Washington policy makers. While the Islamic movement is active in Yemen and has chalked up some notable successes over the years, including the attack on the U.S.S. Cole and the Saudi interior minister, Saleh probably exaggerated its influence in the country in order to win more aid and support from Saudi Arabia and the West, they said.

The real challenge facing Yemen is the economy, which needs to be restarted if the country isn’t going to slide into the ranks of the world’s failed states.

“It’s going to take a lot of work to bring it back to where it was before, to get oil production back up, to get foreign currency reserves back up and bring the devaluation of the riyal and inflation back down,” said Boone of The Yemen Times.

(With reporting by David Rosenberg)

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Paris, France (AHN) – Growth in the euro zone’s services sector economy slowed slightly in May and business confidence weakened to its lowest point in 18 months, according to surveys released on Friday.

The slowdown in growth occurred despite inflationary pressures beginning to ease.

Eurozone growth slowed to a four-month low of 56 in May, down slightly from 56.7 in April, according to the Markit Eurozone Services PMI released Friday. Any reading over 50 represents growth.

However, business activity was not uniform among eurozone nations with France recording the strongest growth. Germany reported slightly slower growth than France did, but it still registered robust expansion. However, other nations saw a weaker trend in growth with Ireland and Spain experiencing modest growth while business activity in Italy was nearly stagnant.

The Markit Eurozone Services PMI measures the changes in the activities of about 2,000 businesses that include diverse companies ranging from hotels to banks. PMI stands for purchasing managers’ indices, which measures the economic performance of a number of sub-indices, or activities, which include such things as prices, service activity and new business.

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Jerusalem, Israel David Rosenberg – Israeli and Indian industry associations signed a memorandum of understating on Wednesday aimed at spurring cross-border innovation and entrepreneurship, as the two countries add high technology to their growing network of trade and economic cooperation.

While bilateral trade has grown exponentially, the agreement between the Confederation of Indian Industry (CII), the country’s biggest trade association, and the Israel High Tech Industries Association, is unusual in that it focuses on technology. The Indian state of Andhra Pradesh, home to the up-and-coming software center of Hyderabad, is close to signing a pact with Israel’s Matimop, a government agency that facilitates multinational research and development ventures.

High tech is important to both countries, but their industries are very different. India is focused on software services — writing code and operating systems for other companies. The National Association of Software & Services Cos (NASSCOM) forecasts will post exports of as much as $70 billion in the year to March 2012. The Israeli industry is much smaller but more diverse, and focuses on developing cutting-edge software, telecommunications and medicine. Exports in 2010 were about $29 billion.

Industry executives see potential to marry Israel’s innovative prowess with India’s huge and talented pool of human resources.

“There’s a complementary software story. Indian firms are entirely process orientated and Israel firms are much more about product,” Naushad Forbes, director of India’s Forbes Marshall and chairman of CII’s Innovation Council, told The Media Line. “If we put those two together, we can be unbeatable worldwide.”

Israel is trying to manage the shifting balance of world economic power. Countries such as China and India post faster growth and present more intriguing markets than the older and slower economies of Europe and the U.S., which have been the biggest markets for Israel’s export-heavy economy. Closer trade and business ties also strengthens Israel’s political standing in the global community.

Starting at $200 million annually when diplomatic relations were established in 1992, trade between Israel and India ballooned to the $4.7 billion mark last year when India vaulted into second place among Israel’s export markets. This does not include defense sales, which are reportedly over $1 billion annually. In the first quarter of this year the level of trade plummeted to just $336 million, the Israel Export Institute reported on Wednesday, but industry figures and government officials are hopeful that growth will resume.

The two countries are negotiating a free-trade-area agreement (FTA) that will remove barriers to trade. In addition to the agreement with Andhra Pradesh, Israel is negotiating bilateral accords with two other Indian states. In March, Israel’s Finance and Industry Ministries allocated 100 million shekels ($29 million) to promote trade with China and India.

Much of the trade until now has been focused on defense, where increased arms spending has created a natural market for Israel military technology like unmanned pilotless vehicles (UPVs) and early airborne radar systems. These ties will likely deepen because of an Indian requirement that local components account for 30 percent of any contract, said Forbes. That will require Israeli companies to outsource or set up manufacturing in India.

Ties between Israeli and Indian technology companies are just starting, but they will likely involve more than sales. Companies will benefit mostly from combining Israeli innovation with India’s vast low-cost manpower.

“Israeli companies are already operating in India. We can learn from each other. There is a tremendous opportunity for collaboration and joint ventures,” Shri Sachin Pilot, the Indian minister of state for communications and information technology, said in Jerusalem.

Andhra Pradesh is already a high tech powerhouse, with software exports last year of $8 billion, equal to half the state’s total. But Ajay Misra, principal secretary to the state’s Information Technology and Communication Department, said India had ambitions to expand out of software into computer and telecommunications hardware. Israeli innovation could help, he said.

“That’s our next step,” he told The Media Line. “We’ve achieved a lot in the software and service sector, but in hardware we haven’t done anything on a big scale.”

In a taste of the kind of tie-ups that may be on the way, Bangalore-based Tejas Networks, India’s largest domestic telecom manufacturing company, is planning to acquire Ethos Networks, an Israel-based high-technology company specializing in carrier Ethernet and network-management products. Tejas now uses the Ethos team as an Israeli R&D center.

Steven Katz, a principal at the Israeli high technology investor,Vertex Venture Capital, said Israeli companies could also benefit from closer ties with India. But, he cautioned, managers will have to be careful about when and how they do it. It is critical that the most innovative parts of any new technology, where Israel’s comparative advantage lies, be developed at home.

“Once you [the company] get to a certain size and you need to build a new software module and you need 20 engineers, that’s when you can perform the development there,” Katz told The Media Line. “But the creativity and ingenuity should stay in Israel.”

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Rafah Terminal, Gaza Strip, Palestinian Territory Omar Ghraieb and David Ro – The Rafah terminal on the Gaza-Egypt border is a subdued place these days.

When Egypt made good on its promise and eased controls governing entry and exit from the Gaza Strip on Saturday, the events received worldwide attention. Hatem Awideh, of the Gaza border, called it “a cornerstone for a new era” while The New York Times headlined it: “Egypt Lifts Blockade, Along With the Gazans’ Hopes.” Israel’s opposition Kadima Party declared the opening a “national failure.” The Turkish organizers of a flotilla due to leave for Gaza with aid supplies next month felt compelled to defend their decision to go ahead with the mission.

But on the first day Rafah was open, only 450 of the 1.6 million Gazans packed into the enclave’s 360 square kilometers (139 square miles) opted to cross. The next day it was just over 590 coming. On Monday, the number declined slightly to about 580. No goods or merchandise, except as much as can be stuffed into a large suitcase, can pass through Rafah at all.

Billed as a major event with multiple political ramifications for Israel, Egypt and the Palestinians, the Egyptian move, in fact, marks just a small step in a gradual easing of a four-year-old blockade of Gaza. Imposed by Israel after the Islamic Hamas movement seized control in 2007 and backed by Egypt, the lockhold on Gaza is aimed at preventing weapons from reaching Hamas and encouraging Gazans to rebel against the movement’s rule.

But a year ago, the two countries removed its most onerous terms following a bungled Israeli commando raid on a Turkish attempt to break the blockade. Egypt eased controls further

By one estimate, more than 130,000 Gazans passed through the crossing in 2010 and another 30,000 passed through it since the start of upheaval in Egypt last January. The difference since last Saturday is that Rafah now operates six days a week instead of five and working hours have been extended by two hours daily. Visa requirements have been lifted for women, children under 18 and men over 40.

“It’s revolutionary compared to what was happening in the past year. It was not revolutionary over what has happened over the past (few) years,” Mkhaimar Abusada, who teaches political science at Gaza’s Al-Azhar University, told The Media Line. “Basically, it’s an upgrading of the facility and mechanism for travel.”

Sami Khader, 48, should have been among the first to line up at the exit ramp from Gaza after it opened. His family came to the enclave in early 2010 for a short vacation to see their relatives and then head back to Saudi Arabia, where they have lived for years. But the family ended up trapped in Gaza and they have lost their permits to reside in the kingdom.

With the Israeli blockade eased and more goods arriving, Gaza’s economy has grown strongly over the past year even though it remains poor and reliant on international aid. The International Monetary Fund estimates Gaza’s gross domestic product grew in the double-digits last year and Palestinians investors are building the coastal strip’s second shopping mall.

On Monday, Palestinian officials pledged $200 million for rebuilding Gaza and hope to raise an additional $800 million from private Arab investors.

“I’m happily living in Gaza now with my family and I don’t need to go back to Saudi Arabia,” Khader told The Media Line. “Who could have known that in one year many things could change? Why can’t you quit one life to lead another one in Gaza, your own home?” Khader said.

The Hamas government in Gaza staged a campaign to ensure a big turnout at Rafah on Saturday, hiring buses to transport people to the terminal and sending activists to encourage people to cross. But, in fact, many people who might want to leave can’t because officials for now are limiting exit permits to people who had previously registered to leave under the older, more restrictive terms.

Sarah Ahmed said she never gave up hope. Her cousin Ahmed Ahmed, she said, gave up hope of finishing his studies abroad, threw away his British visa and enrolled in the Islamic university in Gaza. But even though she has been trapped in Gaza for close to a year after coming back for a family visit, she declined to enroll in any local university.

“I’m still waiting for my turn to leave Gaza and renew my British visa and continue my studies at Glasgow University,” Sarah Ahmed, a student studying in Britain, told The Media Line. “I love it there, and I can’t wait to go back”.

Abusada of Al-Azhar said the registration system is a holdover from a 2005 agreement governing border controls at Rafah. They date from just after Israel evacuated Gaza and before Hamas took over Gaza. Egypt required a list of people seeking to cross to prevent people regarded as security risks from entering the country.

But now with the border open to everyone except men between 18 and 40, it is mainly in Hamas interest to keep the pre-registration policy in force, he said.

“If there was no pre-registration the border would be flooded with tens of thousand who want to leave, so they are regulating the movement,” Abusada said. “Once the border is open for three months or six months, and Palestinians have become accustomed to it, they will cancel registration.”

He predicted a crush at Rafah come summer. Gazan school children are taking year-end exams now, which means many families would prefer to wait till the vacation begins. The limited hours at the terminal, which during the 1990s was open 24 hours a day, will exacerbate the problem.

No goods are permitted through Rafah, but the terminal was never designed as a transit point for merchandise and none of the sides involved would want to see that change, analysts said.

Israel allows more goods than ever in the past four years through its border with Gaza – on Monday around 240 truckloads of goods entered, including 60 containing construction materials – and collects customs duties on import wares that is then passed over to the Palestinians Authority. Meanwhile, Hamas collects it own taxes on good smuggled through the many tunnels dug under the border with Egypt.

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Washington, D.C., United States (AHN) – The United States put up a brave face on Friday in Washington as Russian delegation rejected U.N. intervention in Syria but Moscow agreed that time for Libyan leader Colonel Moammer Gaddafi was up.

Addressing journalists in Washington, Mark Toner, the U.S. State Department spokesman said, “In terms of the Security Council, I mean, obviously, we’ve been in discussions with our partners there about the most appropriate approach to condemning the ongoing violence in Syria.”

“We support pursuing a Security Council resolution. But beyond that, I don’t have any comment,” added Toner during the daily briefing at the State Department.

Pressed further about the Russian position of no-action on Syria, Toner, said, “We feel that the international community is increasingly concerned by the ongoing violence in Syria. We’re working through a variety of forums to apply pressure on the Asad regime and we’re going to continue to do that.”

Earlier, Russians had minced no words as Sergei Ryabkov, Russian deputy foreign minister told journalists, “We will not even read the text,” adding, “There are no grounds to consider this issue (of Syria) in the U.N. security council.”

On Libya, however, there was unanimous agreement that the Libyan leader had lost all legitimacy and had to go as the G8 communique, said, “Gaddafi and the Libyan government have failed to fulfil their responsibility to protect the Libyan population and have lost all legitimacy. He has no future in a free, democratic Libya. He must go.”

The ongoing democratic winds of change with Arab Spring got applauded not only with words but also with financial support as the world’s industrialized nations promised $20 billion over the next two years in the form of loans and financial aid to Tunisia, the flag bearers of change and Egypt with the mandatory condition for the duo to continue on the road to develop democratic institutions and implementing democracy.

Europeans lead the way with the European Bank for Reconstruction and Development (EBRD) announcing the expansion of its mandate to cover North Africa and the Middle East. The EBRD is set to invest billions in coming years to help the democratic process and help the economies to improve the conditions of populations in those countries.

The G8 communique also commented on the global economy saying, “The world economy is recovering,” but reiterated need for more action to reduce global imbalances and deficits.

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Washington, DC, United States (AHN) – The U.S. economy grew at a meager 1.8 percent during the first quarter of the year, according to the U.S. Commerce Department’s Bureau of Economic Analysis report released Thursday.

That was down from the 3.1 percent growth in real gross domestic product (GDP) registered in the fourth quarter of 2010.

It was the Commerce Department’s second estimate of real GDP for the first quarter of 2011. The 1.8 percent annual growth rate in real GDP was unchanged from the advance report released last month. In addition, it was below the private-sector expectations for an upward revision, the Commerce Department said in a release.

The private sector had expected a 2 percent growth in GDP.

“Today’s report shows little change from the GDP estimates released last month,” said U.S. Commerce Department Chief Economist Mark Doms. “What today’s data does tell us is that corporate profits continue to grow and businesses continue to hire more workers. In the first four months of this year, the economy added 854,000 jobs, and that will help boost our economy further in the quarters ahead.”

Indeed, although unemployment remains high and hiring remains low, the initial estimate for corporate profits is that they grew by $21.9 billion in the first quarter of 2011 to reach $1,700.2 billion.

Real GDP is the output of goods and services produced by labor and property that is located in the U.S. It is expressed as an annualized figure based on what growth would be for the year if it continued at that pace.

A drop in consumer spending contributed to the slowdown in economic growth.

Consumer spending accounts for more than two-thirds of GDP. Growth in consumer spending during the first three months of the year was revised downward from 2.7 percent to 2.2 percent.

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Washington, D.C., United States (AHN) – Human rights advocates warned Tuesday about potential civil rights violations in a congressional bill that proposes long-term jailing of immigrants who cannot be returned promptly to their home countries.

The bill was the subject of a House Judiciary subcommittee on immigration policy and enforcement hearing in Washington, D.C.

The Supreme Court has ruled that immigrants awaiting deportation can be detained by U.S. police no more than six months.

The Keep Our Communities Safe Act proposed by Rep. Lamar Smith (R-Texas) would eliminate the six-month time limit.

Instead, the immigrants could be held in jail as long as the courts decide they represent a threat to society.

“According to recent data provided by Immigration and Customs Enforcement, nearly 4,000 dangerous criminal immigrants have been released each year since 2008,” Smith said at the hearing Tuesday.

He mentioned the examples of two immigrants – one from China and the other from Cuba – who committed murders after being released under the six-month time limit on detention.

Both of them were due for deportation, but their home countries refused to accept them because of suspicions about their criminal behavior.

Instead, the Cuban, Abel Arango, murdered a Fort Myers, Florida, police officer when he was freed from jail in the United States and the Chinese man, Huan Chen, murdered a personal rival.

“Just because a criminal immigrant cannot be returned to their home country does not mean they should be freed into our communities,” Smith said. “Dangerous criminal immigrants need to be detained.”

His bill, H.R. 1932, would allow detention of immigrants beyond six months if they refuse to cooperate with deportation proceedings, they risk disrupting foreign relations, creating national security threats or have criminal records showing violent tendencies. Some immigrants that carry “a highly contagious disease” also could be confined beyond six months.

A representative from the American Civil Liberties Union said the Keep Our Communities Safe Act is nearly certain to result in long-term detentions of innocent people.

Only some immigrants awaiting deportation are criminals, said Ahilan T. Arulanantham, deputy legal director of the ACLU of Southern California.

“In many other situations, however, the trigger for immigration detention is not criminal activity at all, but instead some other kind of immigration matter, such as overstaying a visa or attempting to gain asylum,” he said. “More than half of the people in immigration detention have never been convicted of any crime.”

In addition, people who could “otherwise contribute to the economy, serve their communities and support their families” would instead be held in detention at an average annual cost of $45,000 per detainee, Arulanantham said.

The 33,000 immigrants awaiting deportation already cost American taxpayers $1.9 billion per year, he said.

Rep. John Conyers (D-Mich.) said he was concerned the bill would throw good people into long detentions along with bad ones, giving them “no opportunity for a bond hearing, even if they create no risk to the public and no risk of flight.”

If the proposed legislation is targeted only at criminals, “This bill doesn’t do that,” Conyers said.

Some witnesses from law enforcement agencies disagreed, saying the bill would protect the safety of the community.

Thomas H. Dupree Jr., a former U.S. deputy assistant attorney general, told the House subcommittee that legal procedural difficulties sometimes make prompt deportation impractical.

“The consequence is that under current law, the government is compelled to release into our communities murderers, child molesters and other predators who pose a clear and direct threat to public safety and national security,” Dupree said.

Gary Mead, U.S. Immigration and Customs Enforcement associate director, described a deportation process that often is slowed by uncooperative foreign countries.

“For example, China, India, Iran and Laos are very slow to issue travel documents to [Immigration and Customs Enforcement],” Mead said. “China and India both engage in lengthy background investigations to verify nationality and identity, thereby substantially delaying the issuance of travel documents.”

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Washington, D.C., United States (AHN) – The U.S. Supreme Court is expected to announce as soon as next week whether it will hear an appeal involving California’s controversial law that grants illegal immigrants in-state tuition at public universities.

The immigrants say they could not afford college if they paid the higher out-of-state tuition rates.

Opponents of the law say taxpayers should not have to subsidize lawbreakers like illegal immigrants.

The controversy extends beyond California to 10 other states that grant reduced tuition to illegal immigrants. Out-of-state tuition can be triple in-state rates.

Courts took up the case of Martinez vs. Regents of the University of California in 2005 when students who paid out-of-state tuition sued the Board of Regents.

They accused the university of violating a 1996 federal law that prohibits public institutions from giving benefits to illegal immigrants.

The University of California’s attorneys argued the state law, AB540, was narrowly written to avoid conflicts with the federal law.

Illegal immigrants can get in-state tuition only if they attend a California high school for three years and graduate.

The same benefit is granted to any graduates of the state’s high schools, thereby eliminating legal U.S. residency as the issue in getting in-state college tuition, attorneys for the University of California argued.

The trial court agreed with the university and dismissed the lawsuit.

However, the California Court of Appeal for the Third District reversed the trial court, saying the state law is preempted by federal law. In other words, illegal immigrants cannot receive in-state tuition.

On appeal in November, the California Supreme Court reversed the Court of Appeal.

Now, it’s the U.S. Supreme Court’s turn to decide the dispute, this time with a likelihood of influencing debate in Congress over how to reform immigration laws.

The Supreme Court justices this week discussed whether to grant the case a hearing or let the California Supreme Court decision stand.

Just before the California Supreme Court accepted the case, Utah Attorney General Mark Shurtleff wrote a letter to the state’s highest court saying the dispute reaches “into the heart of the national debate about illegal immigration.”

Utah, along with New York and Texas, is among the states that allow illegal immigrants to pay in-state tuition.

Other states, such as Arizona, are strongly opposed to granting any benefits to illegal immigrants.

They have been joined by the Pacific Legal Foundation, a public interest law group, which filed an amicus brief that supports cutting off in-state tuition to illegal immigrants.

If the state law granting in-state tuition is upheld, “overburdened state taxpayers, who are suffering under California’s devastated economy, will be forced to continue subsidizing the college education of adult illegal immigrants,” the Pacific Legal Foundation said in a statement.

The foundation says in-state tuition gives the equivalent of a taxpayer-subsidized scholarship worth between $43,884 to $80,872 at a four year college.

However, LatinoJustice, a civil rights organization that filed an amicus brief in the case, said in a statement that the lawsuit against AB540 “threatens to erect an insurmountable barrier for high-achieving high school graduates from pursuing higher education in hopes of bettering themselves and benefiting their communities as a whole.”

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Athens, Greece (AHN) – An International Monetary Bank official warned Greece on Wednesday that the nation’s plans to reduce its budget deficit are not sufficient and that it must do more to accomplish the job.

Poul Thomsen, the IMF official leading the delegation to Greece, told a conference in Athens that under the country’s current deficit reduction plans Greece would have a hard time just getting the deficit below 10 percent.

Greece has a contractual obligation to get its deficit down to 7.6 percent of gross domestic product in order to meet the terms of its bailout by the European Union and IMF. EU and IMF officials are holding up the next payment of bailout funds until they see the details of any additional austerity plans Greece might formulate.

In the meantime, government officials are going ahead with plans to sell some state assets with the goal of raising $71 billion.

The head of the eurozone’s finance ministers has suggested a “soft” restructuring of Greece’s debts. However, the chief economist for the European Union Central Bank, Greek officials and some others have come out in opposition to the idea, saying it would be disastrous for the Greek economy and not much better for the eurozone.

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