Healthy Skepticism Library item: 11821
Warning: This library includes all items relevant to health product marketing that we are aware of regardless of quality. Often we do not agree with all or part of the contents.
Publication type: news
Wyeth now hit by punitive damages in HRT case
Pharma Times 2007 Oct 16
http://www.pharmatimes.com/WorldNews/ViewArticle.aspx?id=11981
Full text:
Wyeth’s legal problems with the hormone replacement therapies Prempro and Premarin continue to make the headlines as a jury in Nevada, USA, says that the firm should pay $99 million in punitive damages in a liability lawsuit.
This Nevada case appears to be never-ending and this latest development follows a ruling last week which found in favour of three women who claimed they developed breast cancer after taking Prempro and Premarin, and ordered Wyeth to pay out $134.5 million in compensation. That figure was later reduced to $35 million and the judge declined the company’s request to have the claim thrown out.
Now Wyeth is objecting to the $99 million it has been told to pay in damages and has appealed. Lawrence Stein, its senior vice president and general counsel, said that “this flawed verdict is the result of a trial riddled with errors,” adding that “the events of last week and the confusion surrounding the jury’s deliberations only confirm our view that this verdict will not survive on appeal.”
The firm is facing over 5,200 actions brought on behalf of 7,900 women in various federal and state courts throughout the USA for claims of breast cancer, stroke, ovarian cancer and heart disease, allegedly resulting from their use of the conjugated oestrogens Prempro or Premarin .
