Nov 21 (Reuters) – When a product becomes hugely successful, lawsuits tend to ensue like honey, regardless of merit.
But so far, the makers of Ozempic and similar drugs have been spared a flood of lawsuits by people who claim the blockbuster weight loss drug caused serious and unexpected side effects.
According to court records in Pacer’s database, only nine such federal cases were pending at press time, ranging from Louisiana, Pennsylvania, Wisconsin, Nebraska, Idaho, and Utah. spread across the state.
At least 9 million prescriptions considered According to analytics firm Trilliant Health. Written about Novo Nordisk’s diabetes drug Ozempic, which has been sold as Wegovy since 2021 as an obesity treatment drug, and Eli Lilly’s Mounjaro, which received approval as a weight loss drug Zepbound earlier this month. However, I am struck by the fact that the number of product liability claims is unusually low.
At least one plaintiff company claims this is just the tip of the iceberg.
Morgan & Morgan has filed six of the lawsuits, five of them in the last week, and litigator Paul Pennock said the company has more than 13,000 customers. Ta. He said the company rejected more than 40,000 other potential plaintiffs because their alleged injuries were not severe enough.
Reuters could not independently verify these numbers, but they do suggest more lawsuits are coming, and quickly. Pennock said the company plans to file additional lawsuits “on a regular basis going forward” as individual allegations are investigated and confirmed.
The lawsuit alleges that Ozempic or its sister drug, commonly known as semaglutide, caused severe gastrointestinal side effects, including vomiting, that lasted more than a month and required emergency department visits or hospitalization. Jaclyn Bjorklund, one of the plaintiffs, said: in court papers She reportedly vomited so much that she lost her teeth.
A Novo Nordisk spokesperson said in an email that the company, which employs DLA Piper partner Lauren Brown as outside counsel, does not comment on pending litigation, but that patient safety is its “top priority.” He said there is.
Eli Lilly, which is represented by outside lawyers at Kirkland & Ellis, including partner James Hurst, said in a statement that it does not believe the lawsuit has merit.
Among the key questions at stake is: Do drug labels adequately warn about the risks of taking the drug? And would the prescribing physician have made a different decision had such additional warnings been in place?
Liability for the alleged injuries could depend on the answer.
According to Ozempic, Prescription informationthe most common side effects are nausea, vomiting, diarrhea, abdominal pain, and constipation, reported by more than 5% of patients.
A Novo Nordisk spokesperson said, “The known risks associated with the use of Ozempic are reflected in the FDA-approved product labeling,” and the company is working closely with the U.S. Food and Drug Administration to ensure that “Ozempic We are continuously monitoring safety.”
Similarly, Lilly said the company is actively engaged in “monitoring, evaluating and reporting safety information for all medicines.”
Side effects include nausea, vomiting and delayed gastric emptying, but Pennock argues that the labeling is insufficient and does not mention the risk of gastroparesis or paralysis of the stomach muscles, for example. do.
“They don’t specifically say what happens to you,” he said.
Pennock said patients often continue to experience debilitating adverse effects even after discontinuing the medication, feeling “nauseous all the time” and limited in what they can eat.
Huge sums of money have been paid in the past in lawsuits against drug companies for failing to warn about side effects, including the largest ever for the diet drug Fen-Phen. ing.
When the combination of fenfluramine or dexfenfluramine and phentermine was introduced 30 years ago, it was hailed by some as a “miracle” in obesity treatment. Millions of people asked for prescriptions.
However, fen-phen was withdrawn from the market in 1997 after studies found a link to serious and even fatal heart valve problems. Fen-phen maker American Home Products (later renamed Wyeth and now part of Pfizer) spent more than $21 billion to settle the lawsuit, my Reuters colleagues reported in 2007. reported.
There are clear differences between fenphen and Ozempic in the prevalence and severity of suspected side effects and warnings (or lack thereof) to patients.
Still, Motley Rice partner Esther Berezovsky, co-lead counsel in the New Jersey fen-phen medical monitoring case currently pending against Novo Nordisk, sees some similarities. I see that there is.
Because so many people are attracted to the promise of losing weight, “the effects of selling weight loss drugs without full disclosure of the risks associated with their use are particularly harmful,” she told me. Told.
In September, she and a colleague at Motley Rice were reported to have suffered severe stomach cramps, vomiting, and nausea within months of starting Wegovy, requiring hospitalization in Pennsylvania for treatment of gastroparesis. The lawsuit was filed on behalf of women.
In their complaint, they allege that Novo Nordisk failed to fully disclose Wigovy’s side effects and instead encouraged people to “forgo the lifestyle changes that were the basis of healthy weight loss and instead take a powerful, dangerous, and expensive drug.” He claims that he encouraged them to support him.
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Report by Jenna Green
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