Archive for March, 2009
Pharmaceutical Litigation
Sunday, March 8th, 2009Seeking Justice for Defective Drugs Through Pharmaceutical Litigation
I founded my law firm on medical malpractice litigation, and gradually moved into pharmaceutical litigation as well. Many firms abandoned this area of law because they believed that federal pre-emption would be too big of an impediment to winning a case. I realized that it was going to take diligence, but still there were many pharmaceutical products cases that needed to be brought to protect consumers from dangerous drugs. The recent 6-3 (March 4, 2009) Supreme Court ruling in Wyeth v. Levine, states that federal law does NOT pre-empt state lawsuits for inadequate drug label warnings. Read more…
Supreme Court Decision
Wednesday, March 4th, 2009
Justice Stevens (pictured) wrote in the Wyeth v. Levine opinion for the court: If Congress thought state lawsuits posed an obstacle to its objectives, it surely would have enacted an express pre-emption provision at some point during the Food, Drug and Cosmetic Act’s 70 year history…Its silence on the issue, coupled with its certain awareness of the prevalence of state tort litigation, is powerful evidence that Congress did not intend FDA oversight to be the exclusive means of ensuring drug safety and effectiveness.”
Surprisingly, even Justice Thomas, concurred with Justice Stevens and also dismissed the Wyeth preemption argument, defining it as unconstitutional: Read more…
