On April 26 a Los Angeles jury awarded a plaintiff $6.5 million in a case arising from the use of Actos, a diabetes drug. The plaintiff claimed that the bladder cancer and death of her husband was due to ingesting Actos. Actos (pioglitazone) is a prescription drug sold by Takeda which is used to treat Type 2 diabetes. It works to balance blood sugar by increasing cells’ receptiveness to insulin. A similar drug is called ActoplusMet which combines metformin. Actos was responsible for $3.4 billion in sales for Takeda in 2009.
If you or a loved one have been diagnosed with bladder cancer and would like a free consultation on your potential legal rights regarding Actos please contact us at our New Jersey office by calling 856-663-8200.
The lawyers at Locks Law feel very strongly about giving back to the communities where they live and work. Please click on the link below to get to an article about partner Marc Weingarten and associates Pamela Lee, Stephanie Milstein and Priscilla Jimenez. These Locks lawyers volunteer time each month to teach civics to a ninth grade class at Girard Academic Music Program (GAMP), which is a Philadelphia public high school. Marc has been teaching in this program for five years and this year he recruited Pam, Steph and Priscilla to join him in this worthy project.
They have now been recognized for their efforts by Trial Lawyers Care, a non-profit organization formed after the attacks of September 11, 2001 to provide free legal services. The mission of this organization is to acknowledge trial lawyers who contribute to their community through volunteer and charitable activities that serve the public good.
We are proud of Marc, Pam, Priscilla and Stephanie for the good work they do both inside the courtroom and out.
Philadelphia Trial Lawyers Volunteer as Civics Teachers
A federal jury in Trenton, NJ will hear evidence that defendant Merck hid known risks about its Fosamax drug during a trial of a case brought by a user alleging Fosamax caused a femur fracture.
There are about 3,300 femur fracture cases involving Fosamax and about 1.200 ONJ (jaw) cases. The first femur trial in New Jersey ended a month ago when the plaintiff suffered a non-Fosamax related health problem during the trial. Merck has won 5 of the 7 trials so far. In February 2013 a federal jury in New York awarded $285,000 to a woman in a jaw case.
New Jersey compounder, Med Prep Consulting Inc., issued a voluntary recall for its products on March 15, 2013. It determined there was mold in “five bags of magnesium sulfate” IV solutions that were “dispensed to a Connecticut hospital”; the hospital was Yale-New Haven. The recall includes dozens of drugs packaged in infusion bags, plastic syringes and glass vials distributed to regional hospitals. The New Jersey State Board of Pharmacy “reached an agreement with the company on Friday to shut down all production and shipping” of its products, which include “dozens of antibiotics, pain relievers and drugs used in surgery and labor.” The company has customers in all 50 states and it has agreed to stop operations until at least March 22. At least 13 hospitals in New Jersey, Delaware, Connecticut and Pennsylvania also received the firm’s 50-milliliter bags of electrolytes in hospitalized patients. Product packed in plastic syringes was also distributed nationwide to doctor’s offices and clinics.
There was an $8.3 million verdict in Los Angeles on March 8 for a plaintiff who sued Johnson & Johnson for its DePuy Hip System product. Plaintiff claimed the product was defective and the jury agreed. 93,000 systems were marketed between 2005 and 2010 when they were recalled. Many cases are in the federal MDL before Judge David Katz (MDL 2197) in Ohio. There are almost 11,000 lawsuits filed.
According to the latest numbers released by the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention (CDC), contaminated steroid injections have caused 720 cases of fungal meningitis and 48 deaths in the United States in the past few months. The Pennsylvania and New Jersey personal injury attorneys of Locks Law provide legal representation to those affected by fungal meningitis. (more…)
The Supreme Court will hear arguments this month in a case involving the liability of a generic drug maker for the horrendous injuries suffered by a New Hampshire woman after she took a generic medication prescribed for shoulder pain. As a result of taking Sulindac (the generic form of Clinoril) Karen Bartlett suffered a type of Stevens-Johnson syndrome known as Toxic Epidermal Necrolysis. A short time after taking the drug Ms. Bartlett’s skin began to slough off and peel, and within weeks she was suffering the equivalent of 2nd and 3rd degree burns over 70% of her body. The drug also burned her esophagus, caused her to become legally blind, and she spent months in a burn unit and more time in a medically induced coma during her treatment. At 53 years old, this formerly active secretary is now totally disabled, has severe lung problems related to the drug and despite 13 surgeries, remains legally blind. She cannot drive, work or even walk to her mailbox. (more…)
In February the FDA instituted a new ‘crackdown’ on compounding pharmacies after the tragic epidemic of fungal meningitis last fall. That resulted from contaminated steroid spinal injection products coming out of the New England Compounding Center (NECC). There are 30 so-called ‘high risk’ companies in about a dozen or so states and the FDA disclosed that inspection reports were issued for four. Ultimately the FDA will inspect all 30 rather than wait for complaints to be filed against these compounders. The FDA issues what is called a 483 Inspection Report after these inspections.
In the recent FOSAMAX trial of Scheinberg v Merck, Merck’s own Associate Vice President for Clinical Research, Dr Arthur Santora, testified that there is no evidence FOSAMAX has any fracture reduction benefit for patients that do not have osteoporosis. Despite this, Merck’s FOSAMAX label indicates that FOSAMAX prevents fractures for patients with pre-osteoporosis (sometimes called ‘osteopenia’) as well as for patients with osteoporosis. There is evidence that 75%-80% of all patients who are prescribed FOSAMAX are actually non-osteoporosis patients. A large amount of the $3.5 billion annual sales of FOSAMAX can be attributed to sales to women who do not have osteoporosis, according to evidence in another trial, Sessner v Merck.
