MNA Daily NewsScan, October 11, 2012: Hospitals spin tales on staffing; Kodak hopes to bail on retiree benefits

HEALTH CARE

The Big Spin:  Hospital Staffing Goes Under the Knife    Jan Rodolfo, Midwest director for National Nurses United, the country’s largest union of registered nurses, said profitable hospitals are behaving much like hospitals in dire financial straits. “Hospitals that are very profitable are still aggressively pursuing cost-cutting measures,” she said. “I think they see an opportunity right now to drive down costs and use the economic climate as the justification.”

Regulator Has Link to Firm Implicated in Meningitis Outbreak   The owners of New England Compounding Center, the Framingham company at the heart of a nationwide outbreak of fungal meningitis, also own a related pharmacy in Westborough, one of whose executives is a board member and former president of the state agency that regulates pharmacies.

LABOR NOTES

Kodak Seeks to End Retiree Health Benefits   Eastman Kodak retirees have known since the company filed for bankruptcy in January that their benefits were in its cross-hairs. The struggling company pulled the trigger Wednesday.