Category Archives: Legal Issues
Actos Lawsuit Discusses History of Actos and Bladder Cancer
On September 9th of 2011, an Actos bladder cancer lawsuit was filed by an Actos lawyer in the United States District Court for the Eastern District of Louisiana. The lawsuit was filed on behalf of a Louisiana husband and wife. The husband developed bladder cancer after using Actos for a number of years. The Actos [...]
Drug Company Was “Prison Raped” At Hepatitis Trial
The editorial below discusses the $1 billion dollar verdict against drug companies Teva and Baxter. Said one lawyer requesting anonymity, “The defense counsel will get absolutely railroaded by Judge Walsh, and when I say railroaded, I mean prison raped.” Those of us out here in the cheap seats were under the impression hepatitis was spread [...]
Solicitor General Files Brief in Pliva v. Mensing, Rejects Preemption
A little late, but better than never. Especially since the Solicitor General agrees that failure to warn lawsuits against generic manufacturers are not preempted by the FDCA: The court of appeals correctly rejected petitioners’ contention that respondent’s failure-to-warn claims are categorically preempted by the FDCA, and its decision is consistent with the decision of the [...]
Vermont Federal Court Embraces Conte, Holds Brand-Name Manufacturer Liable
Here’s a hypothetical for you: A patient goes to see a doctor about chronic heartburn. The doctor thinks Reglan might be a good choice, so the doctor goes to the Physicians’ Desk Reference and reads the label for Reglan. That label was written by Wyeth, which was the brand-name manufacturer of Reglan. Based upon what [...]
$257 Million Dollar Verdict In Risperdal Lawsuit
This is not a good year for Johnson & Johnson. Johnson & Johnson lost a $257.7 million jury verdict in Louisiana for making misleading claims about the safety of the company’s Risperdal antipsychotic drug. * * * * The jury found 35,542 violations of the state’s Medical Assistance Programs Integrity Law and imposed a penalty [...]
Big Pharma Could End Mass Tort Litigation, But It Is More Profitable To Get Sued
That sounds crazy, I know. But here’s my logic. The vast majority of pharmaceutical lawsuits are brought under what’s called a failure to warn theory of liability. Failure-to-warn lawsuits allege that a manufacturer of a drug didn’t accurately inform a plaintiff about the risks associated with taking a specific drug. If the manufacturer does give [...]
Another Wyeth Preemption Case Goes to the Supreme Court
Bruesewitz v. Wyeth looks like it will be the Wyeth v. Levine of vaccine lawsuits: Erwin Chemerinsky, a liberal scholar, and Kenneth Starr, a conservative, may appear to be the Oscar and Felix of constitutional law, but they’re also friends and, perhaps surprisingly, share essentially the same view in one, increasingly hard-fought area of constitutional [...]
Allergan’s $600 Million Dollar Headache
Drug marketing 101: The FDA approves drugs for specific ailments. Drug companies may not market the drug to treat any other type of ailment. If they do, it’s called off-label marketing and it is illegal. Drug marketing 201: It’s often very profitable to engage in off-label marketing, because the fines you pay are less than [...]
Trasylol Cases Settling For $510,000 or so
Back in 2008, I wrote about the sad story of Trasylol. (I’ll wait if you want to read that post as background.) Fast forward a little over two years, and many of the lawsuits filed over Trasylol are starting to settle. That’s good news for the patients injured by Trasylol: Drugmaker Bayer AG has agreed [...]
Will the FDA Finally Get Subpoena Power & Recall Authority?
Did you know that the FDA doesn’t have subpoena power? That’s the power to make a company hand over a document. Every single attorney in the U.S. can subpoena a document from a pharmaceutical company, but the FDA (which is supposed to regulate pharmaceuticals) doesn’t have that power. Citing a recent spike in pharmaceutical recalls, [...]
