Swine flu

ST. PAUL, Minn. - Businessman Tom Petters wanted to "live the life of a corporate tycoon," so he engineered a Ponzi scheme that bilked investors out of billions of dollars, prosecutors said at the start of his fraud trial Wednesday.

ALBANY, N.Y. - New York state health officials have suspended a ruling that would have forced health care workers across the state to get vaccinated against the swine flu by the end of November or risk losing their jobs, saying in a decision issued Thursday that they did so because the vaccine is in short supply.

TRENTON, N.J. - Growth of prescription drug revenue worldwide will likely dip to between 4 percent and 6 percent next year - the lowest rate in at least a decade, according to a forecast to be released Thursday.

SPOKANE, Wash. - A court hearing for a jail inmate in Spokane, Wash., had to be postponed a day because he was wearing a surgical mask and his defense lawyer refused to sit next to him.

NEW CITY, N.Y. - A former New York City police officer accused of holding a suburban schools superintendent at gunpoint is blaming post traumatic stress for his alleged actions.