NATIONAL BRIEFS

MISSOURI: Injunction on levee rejected

The U.S. Supreme Court refused Sunday night to halt a plan by the Army Corps of Engineers to blast open a levee to relieve the rain-swollen Mississippi River. Justice Samuel Alito, who handles emergency requests from states in the 8th Circuit in the Midwest, did not comment in denying Missouri's request to block the plan. Maj. Gen. Michael Walsh said a decision had not yet been made to breach the levee, flooding 130,000 acres of farmland and destroying the homes of 200 Missourians. The breach would increase the Mississippi's ability to accommodate the rising Ohio River, relieving Cairo, Ill., and other towns.

WASHINGTON: A passport in limbo

Menachem Zivotofsky was born in a Jerusalem hospital in 2002. Two months later, his mother showed up at the U.S. Embassy in Tel Aviv to get him a passport. Menachem's parents, Ari and Naomi, were born in the United States so there was no question that he was American, too. But State Department officials refused to issue documents indicating he was born in Israel, citing U.S. policy to refrain from expressing an official view about Jerusalem's status. The dispute over Menachem's passport has landed at the Supreme Court. The justices could say as early as Monday whether they will hear the case.

NATIONWIDE: Dangerous drug shortage

Doctors, hospitals and federal regulators are struggling to cope with an unprecedented surge in drug shortages in the United States that is endangering cancer patients, heart attack victims, accident survivors and a host of other ill people. A record 211 medications became scarce in 2010, triple the number in 2006, and 89 new shortages have been recorded through the end of March. The paucities are forcing some medical centers to ration drugs, including one needed by leukemia patients; postpone surgeries and other care, and scramble for substitutes, often resorting to alternatives that may be less effective, have more side effects and boost the risk for sometimes-fatal errors.