As the number of the Xarelto lawsuits filed in the Multidistrict Litigation in the Eastern District of Louisiana capped over 3,000 cases, the much smaller Pennsylvania Mass Tort is still growing. Due to the increasing number of litigations that keep being filed every day, the litigations have been consolidated into two large groups by the Court of Common Pleas. The smaller one, the Philadelphia Pennsylvania one, now reached over 550 total cases, although being still in pretrial and discovery stages, many new litigations can be filed to join them. The lawsuits have been consolidated because of the common the allegations and the same defendants. Plaintiffs did, in fact, alleged that Bayer AG and Janssen Pharmaceuticals, (a pharmaceutical company of Johnson & Johnson corporation) released a dangerous drug to the market.
Today rivaroxaban largely surpassed its competitor, the 40-year-old blood thinner Warfarin, and is the leading anticoagulant in the market, despite its concerning risks. Plaintiffs’ accusations against the manufacturer include negligence in warning the public of the dangers of the anticoagulant drug Xarelto. The controversial blood thinner is, in fact, deemed responsible for hundreds, if not thousands, of cases of patients injured or even killed by its dangerous side effects. The new anticoagulant recently received the “black box” FDA warning, a label that indicates that a given drug is much more dangerous than the others. This blood thinner’s effects cannot be reversed due to the lack of a proper antidote, and may lead to life-threatening uncontrolled bleeding accidents. Patients who suffered from any type of injury while using this medication filed their lawsuits to ask for proper compensation for the damage they sustained.
Article written by: Dr. Claudio Butticè, Pharm.D.
Published: 2016/03/08
