Class Action Lawsuits

posted by on Jul 31

Avandia Settlement Reaches $460 Million

GlaxoSmithKline PLC will pay $460 million in an Avandia settlement following the Avandia lawsuits filed this year.  Around 13,000 suits claimed the drug company failed to warn its customers that Avandia posed risks for heart attacks in people taking the drug.  Avandia is a diabetes drug, which allegedly causes heart attacks.  GlaxoSmithKline is the UK’s biggest drug maker, and will settle about 10,000 of the 13,000 cases against it.

Avandia is a drug manufactured to treat Type 2 Diabetes, but the FDA had recommended it be removed from the shelves due to risk of heart attacks and heart failure.  There is a safer alternative, called Actos.  It is believed that Avandia was responsible for 300 deaths in the last three months of 2009.

Avandia class action lawsuits allege that GlaxoSmithKline hid the fact that Avandia posed a heart attack risk.  The average Avandia settlement is $46,000.

The first round of Avandia settlements occurred in May, when they paid $60 million to settle about 700 cases.  Drugmakers often settle to save time and money.  Plaintiffs claim they suffered needlessly, after taking Avandia.  A growing body of reports causes skepticism over the drug’s safety.

$3.5 billion has been set aside by GlaxoSmithKline for Avandia settlement and litigation costs.  They will continue to settle many cases out of court, but not all of them.  The first Avandia case will go to trial this Fall in Philadelphia.  All suits claim GlaxoSmithKline suppressed information about the health risks posed by their drug to people taking it to treat their diabetes.

posted by on Feb 21

Avandia Class Action Over Side Effects

An Avandia class action is brewing since release this week of a Senate investigation into the popular Diabetes drug.  Confidential federal reports link Avandia to heart attacks and heart failures, and over three hundred deaths in the last three months of 2009.

Avandia is a drug made by GlaxoSmithKline for treatment of Diabetes Type 2.  The drug has been controversial for years, as some reports held by the Feds link Avandia side effects to heart failure and heart attacks.  But only this week has the idea of an Avandia class action hit the news, because of the Senate investigation.

Results of the investigation are that GlaxoSmithKline should have warned patients who take Avandia about the serious side effects.  Scientists from the FDA even advocate removing Avandia from the market.  There is an alternative, called Actos, which has not been associated with such serious side effects.

Avandia has been linked to 500 heart attacks and 300 heart failures each month.  Reports as far back as 2007 from studies conducted on patients taking Avandia show links to heart problems from the drug.  In 2006, sales of Avandia produced for GlaxoSmithKline $3.2 billion.  After the 2007 study, profits decreased for Avandia, which had once been one of the biggest-selling drugs in the world.

The main point of the Avandia class action is that GlaxoSmithKline failed to put warnings on the label about the serious side effects.