Yaz Lawsuits Consolidated in Illinois Federal Court

January 12, 2010, 2:00PM. By Jane Mundy

St. Louis, ILUp to 25,000 women nationwide who have suffered serious and even deadly injuries allegedly caused by Yaz have filed lawsuits against Bayer Corp., the manufacturer of the oral contraceptive. The suits will now be consolidated as a multidistrict litigation (MDL) at the federal courthouse in East St. Louis.

The number of Yaz cases involved would make this MDL consolidation the largest ever assigned to the East St. Louis district.

According to the Belleville News-Democrat, U.S. District Chief Judge David Herndon is presiding over the pretrial discovery of Yaz. Herdon said he may then hold bellwether trials to be conducted later around the US. "These trials will serve as a guideline for other cases," Herndon said. "There will be a variety of dynamics which will be taken into account in the evaluation of cases."

In an MDL, there isn't a single trial that resolves all of the cases. Instead, the case is consolidated under one federal judge who handles all of the discovery matters and rulings on the admissibility of evidence that are common to all of the defendants. An MDL is generally more efficient and will often have more impact on the effort required to gather and review all of the relevant documents in the case.

An MDL will allow both sides to make a case in a cost-effective and timely manner. No doubt Bayer Corp. does not want to produce their records to thousands and thousands of plaintiff's lawyers; similarly, the plaintiffs' lawyers won't have to "go it alone."

Women who have filed suits against Bayer allege the company failed to adequately warn them of the risks associated with Yaz and illegally marketed the drug for treatments the Food and Drug Administration has not approved. The suits claim that Yaz causes strokes, heart attacks, pulmonary embolism, thrombosis, cardiac arrhythmia, gallbladder disease, kidney failure and sudden death.