What Happened In The MassTorts World Last Week? 2020-Jan-06

J&J's 8th Win Over Talc-Cancer Trial

On Friday, Jurors in state court in St. Louis favored Johnson & Johnson (J&J) over a lawsuit brought by a woman alleging that the company’s talcum-based baby powder caused her ovarian cancer.

According to the court memorandum, the 56-year-old, a registered nurse, claimed that the use of baby powder as part of her feminine hygiene routine for more than 30 years was the reason for her cancer, which was diagnosed in 2012. She further alleged that the product contained asbestos-tainted talc, and the company failed to warn about its health risks.

The verdict is J&J’s first win in the St. Louis courts since last year and eighth victory in talc-cancer cases this year. The company also won a similar case in California on Monday, last week, making this its fourth win since October. In 2016, the company lost three of the first four cases tried in St. Louis courts, all of which were overturned on appeal.

Johnson's Baby Powder, one of the most popular products containing talcum powder, is linked to increasing a woman's risk of ovarian cancer if she uses it regularly in the genital area. In a few cases, the cancer tissue was studied using an electron microscope and was found to have talc in it, which supported the claim that the cancer was caused by the body powder and increases the talc-related cancer risk.

Nearly 14,000 Talcum Powder and Shower-to-Shower lawsuits are consolidated under multidistrict litigation MDL No. 2738; In Re: Johnson & Johnson Talcum Powder Products Marketing, Sales Practices, and Products Liability Litigation. Lawsuits are also pending in a coordinated California proceeding under Judicial Council Coordinated Proceeding No. 4877.

U.S. Government Sides Bayer In Roundup Lawsuit

The U.S. government sided with the German company, Bayer, claiming that the ruling that found the pesticide Roundup causes cancer should be overturned.

According to a friend of the court brief filed on Friday with a San Francisco-based appeals court, the Environmental Protection Agency (EPA) stated that the jury finding based on California law over the weed-killing product should be reversed as they have reviewed and approved its warning label. The Department of Justice backed EPA in its argument.

Last summer, a U.S. district judge rejected to reverse the jury finding that Roundup was defective, slashing the $25 million amount to be awarded to a man who claimed years of Roundup exposure caused his non-Hodgkin's lymphoma.

Roundup contains glyphosate, which is the most widely used herbicide in the U.S. A study from environmental groups found 21 oat-based cereal and snack products, including Cheerios, contain traces of glyphosate. In May, EPA maintained that glyphosate, when used in accordance with its current label, is safe for public health, and glyphosate is not a carcinogen.

IARC, considered to be the apex in the field of cancer research, classified glyphosate as a “probable human carcinogen.” According to IARC, Roundup is made up of other ingredients that are toxic in themselves, and are also known to increase the toxicity of glyphosate. Monsanto has known this for many years but still refuses to study the link between cancer and Roundup.

Monsanto has a brief history of legal troubles and Glyphosate is just another herbicide of the company to attract lawsuits. Plaintiffs across the U.S. have filed numerous lawsuits. A plaintiff from one of the Roundup lawsuits claims that she worked as a grower’s assistant on a crop field in New York from 1994 to 1998 where Roundup was regularly sprayed indoors and outdoors resulting in chronic lymphocytic leukemia in 2012. She eventually quit the job and is currently seeking reasonable compensation and punitive damages in court.

Lawsuit Claims Six Years Of Roundup Exposure Caused Cancer

Earlier this month, Bayer faced another lawsuit by a laborer who alleged six years of Roundup exposure for his cancer.

According to a court memorandum, the plaintiff filed a lawsuit in the U.S. District Court for the District of Connecticut, indicating that he was exposed to the herbicide at North East Laborer’s Training Academy in Pomfret, Connecticut, every week from about 2008 through 2014 while doing general maintenance. Petajasoja was diagnosed with non-Hodgkins lymphoma in February 2018. The case will join 2,500 other similar cases pending in the federal court system and more than 40,000 cases filed in various state courts nationwide.

Recently, the German company also appealed to the U.S. federal court to reverse a $25 million verdict awarded to a Californian man, who alleged the company’s Roundup weed killer for his cancer.

Meanwhile, the Department of Justice backed the Environmental Protection Agency's (EPA) argument that the jury's finding based on California law over the weed-killing product should be reversed as they have reviewed and approved its warning label.

U.S. District Judge Vince Chhabria is presiding over all Roundup federal multidistrict litigation (MDL No. 2741; In Re: Roundup Products Liability Litigation) in the Northern District of California.

Ohio County Creates Position To Manage Opioid Deal Fund

On Monday, Cuyahoga County of Ohio announced that a position is created to ensure that all the settlement amount received from the opioid litigation be used to combat the epidemic.

Brandy Carney, the county's former chief of public safety and justice services officer, is appointed to handle the settlement funds by Cuyahoga County Executive Armond Budish. An annual salary of $130,500 from the settlement amount will go to Carney.

The task assigned to Carney involves the management of the current settlement amount, totaling around $179 million, between the county and major drug companies. She will be reporting to Chief of Staff Bill Mason. The county stated that the position is created to guarantee that the money will solely be used to address opioid addiction.

Opioids are on the market for ages and have been used basically for pain relief for post-surgical pain, cancer-related pain, chronic or persistent pain. Opioids when used in proper dosage and along with a combination of other pain treatments, work in relieving pain successfully, unless there is a misuse or abuse of the drug.

Companies manufacturing opioids convinced the medical community that these medications were not addictive and were purely beneficial. This belief raised the number of prescriptions and sales unwarrantedly, resulting in a mass misuse of these drugs, to the extent that this was identified by the U.S. Food and Drug Administration (FDA) as a public issue and named it an opioid crisis.

U.S. District Judge Dan Polster is presiding over more than 2,600 lawsuits consolidated under MDL No. 2804 (In Re: National Prescription Opiate Litigation).

Four Peer-Reviewed Studies Support Talc Ovarian Cancer Link

Attorneys representing plaintiffs in the talcum powder lawsuits have indicated to the U.S. District Judge Freda L. Wolfson in the District of New Jersey, that four new peer-reviewed studies show that talc powder can cause ovarian cancer.

Judge Wolfson, presiding over thousands of Baby Powder lawsuits and Shower-to-Shower lawsuits, is considering challenges to the admissibility of proposed expert witness testimony before the first federal court trials. This will help determine whether the evaluations presented are sufficiently reliable under the federal Daubert standard to allow juries to hear the cases.

According to a letter sent to Judge Wolfson on December 24, plaintiffs’ attorneys presented the findings of four new peer-reviewed studies, which they believe will provide further support for the general causation opinions that would be provided by their experts.

Meanwhile, the defendants, in their December 31 response to the letter, are urging the judge to disregard four peer-reviewed studies as the court oversaw a Daubert hearing in July, asserting that they do not support the reliability of plaintiffs’ experts’ opinions.

Opioid Overdose Antidote Gets A Nod From NY AG

On Thursday, New York's attorney general Letitia James announced a deal stating more companies will be able to make an easy-to-use version of opioid overdose antidote.

As per the agreement by the attorney general’s office, Adapt Pharma, which was acquired by Rockville, Maryland-based Emergent BioSolutions in 2018, had the sole rights to sell the drug nalmefene using Aptar Pharma's nasal spray technology. Following the agreement, Emergent will no longer hold a contract that allowed it to be the only company to develop a nasal spray using nalmefene, which is still in the making and not in the market.

The agreement will not affect already in use Narcan, a spray version of the drug naloxone now sold by Emergent, as the agreement is not subject to spray technology. Narcan is popular among police, firefighters, and others who use it on people affected by overdose.

The easy-to-use version antidote would still require Food and Drug Administration approval before the product goes into the market.