Herbalife came out swinging Thursday against claims made by hedge fund manager William Ackman that the business amounts to a pyramid scheme.

A series of executives looked to refute Ackman’s allegations during an analyst and investor meeting, laying out everything from how the business operates to who its customers are.

Critics have questioned the company’s business model, which uses a network of distributors to sell its nutritional supplements and weight-loss products in more than 80 countries.

The defense put forth by Herbalife Thursday comes a few weeks after Pershing Square Capital’s Ackman alleged Herbalife Ltd. was a pyramid scheme and that he was shorting the stock. Short-sellers make money when the shares they’re betting against decline.

The Food and Drug Administration is requiring makers of Ambien and similar sleeping pills to lower the dosage of their drugs, based on studies suggesting patients face a higher risk of injury due to morning drowsiness.

The agency says new research shows that the widely-used sleeping drugs remain in the blood at levels high enough to interfere with driving, which increases the risk of car accidents.

Regulators are ordering drug manufacturers to cut the dose of the medications in half for women, who process the drug more slowly. The FDA is also recommending that manufacturers use the lower doses for men, though it will not be mandatory.

The new doses apply to all insomnia treatments containing the drug zolpidem, which is sold under the brands Ambien, Edluar and Zolpimist.

A new report says the United States suffers far more violent deaths than any other wealthy nation, due in part to the widespread possession of firearms and the practice of storing them at home.

Gun violence is just one of many factors contributing to lower U.S. life expectancy, but the finding takes on urgency because the report comes less than a month after the shooting deaths of 20 children and six educators at an elementary school in Newtown, Conn.

The U.S. has about six violent deaths per 100,000 residents. None of the 16 other countries included in the review came close to that ratio.

For many years, Americans have been dying at younger ages than people in other wealthy countries. The U.S. also suffers high rates of drug-related deaths and infant mortality.

A national report says Nebraska was one of two states that experienced its hottest and driest year on record in 2012.

The  State of the Climate Report released Tuesday shows Nebraska and Wyoming broke their state records last year.

The National Climatic Data Center’s report shows the average annual U.S. temperature was 55.32 degrees Fahrenheit. That’s a full degree Fahrenheit warmer than the old 1998 record.

Iowa saw its second warmest year on record. It also had its 11th driest year.

U.S. temperature records go back to 1895. The yearly average is based on reports from more than 1,200 weather stations across the Lower 48 states.

Officials say a child from Lancaster County in southeast Nebraska has died from the flu.

The Nebraska Department of Health and Human Services said Tuesday that the child’s death is the second attributed to the flu this season. A man in his 60s from Lancaster County also died earlier this season, though additional details were not available.

Health officials say children can be more susceptible to flu complications.

Officials have categorized the state’s flu level as widespread. That means cases have been reported in at least half the regions of the state, but it hasn’t peaked yet. Officials are calling it a heavy flu season for the state.

Officials say it’s not too late for people to get the flu vaccine.

A Nevada man caught hauling 136 pounds of pot through Nebraska in early 2011 has been sentenced to prison.

Lincoln media reports Michael Doyle, of Reno, Nev., was sentenced Tuesday to two to four years in prison. A Lancaster County judge dismissed his pleas for probation.

A Nebraska state trooper confiscated the drugs during a March 2011 traffic stop on Interstate 80 in Lincoln. Two pounds of hashish and a gun also were found in the truck.

Doyle later pleaded no contest to possession of more than a pound of marijuana and intent to deliver hashish.

Two more light earthquakes have been recorded near the spot where a major temblor struck over the weekend in Southeast Alaska.

The Alaska Earthquake Information Center say a magnitude 4.7 quake occurred Tuesday night, after a magnitude 4.0 quake earlier in the day.

The center says the evening quake was felt in Craig, Petersburg and Kupreanof and was centered 72 miles west of Craig. There were no immediate damage reports.

The earlier quake was centered 98 miles west-northwest of Craig.

Both were close to where Saturday’s powerful magnitude 7.5 earthquake struck. That earthquake prompted a tsunami warning for hundreds of miles of coastline in Alaska and Canada.

The alert was canceled when no damaging waves were generated.

The earthquake center says several aftershocks have occurred since Saturday.

The widow of a Chicago lottery winner who died of cyanide poisoning says she has no idea who in their family asked that authorities take the deeper look into what originally was believed to be a death by natural causes.

Shabana Ansari spoke to The Associated Press on Tuesday, a day after news emerged that her husband’s death in July was the result of cyanide poisoning.

Prosecutors, Chicago police and the Cook County Medical Examiner’s Office are investigating 46-year-old Urooj (oo-ROOJ’) Khan’s death as a homicide. But they have not given any details, announced any suspects or ascribed any possible motive.

They’ve also not identified the relative who asked for a deeper look into Khan’s death. Ansari said she didn’t make the request and didn’t know who did.

A store clerk has been shot in a leg during a robbery in the Omaha suburb of Papillion.

Police say two to four people wearing sunglasses, black clothes and ski masks brandished guns as they entered the Radio Shack around 8:30 p.m. Tuesday. No customers were inside, but there were three employees.

One was shot in a thigh and later taken to Nebraska Medical Center in Omaha. Another shot was fired but no other injuries have been reported.

Police say the robbers took some money and electronic devices before fleeing in a vehicle.

No arrests have been reported.

A 38-year-old man has been caught after evading law enforcement officers for nearly eight hours in southeast Nebraska.

Authorities say Matthew Mundhenke, of Milford, was arrested a little before 4 a.m. Tuesday in the front yard of a house in Seward.

Seward County Sheriff Joe Yocum says the search for Mundhenke began around 8:15 p.m. Monday. Witnesses told police that Mundhenke had threatened people and assaulted one at a home in Staplehurst before fleeing. Officers followed his tracks in the snow and spotted him near a ravine, but he got away.

He was arrested several hours later on suspicion of several crimes, including domestic assault and using a weapon to commit a felony.

Online records say Mundhenke remained in the jail Wednesday. Online court records don’t yet list the case.