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Ethicon Media Monitoring 6/9/2017
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Woman Awarded $2.1M in Fourth Pelvic Mesh Trial
Jun 8, 2017 | The Legal Intelligencer
By P.J. D'Annunzio,
.... A Philadelphia jury has awarded $2.1 million to a woman claiming she experienced ongoing pain resulting from the deterioration of a pelvic mesh implant. -
Adkins Pelvic Mesh Trial in Philadelphia Enters 13th Day Friday
Jun 9, 2017 | Mesh Medical Device Newsdesk
The trial of Kimberly Adkins enters its 13th day in a Philadelphia Courtroom, focused on the Ethicon pelvic mesh product TVT-Secur, which is no longer on the market. -
Here's Why Endo International plc Stock Surged Today
Jun 8, 2017 | The Motley Fool
By Cory Renauer
Shares of Endo International plc (NASDAQ:ENDP), a pharmaceutical company that's been beaten down over the past couple years, rose 11.1% higher as of 3:50 p.m. EDT during Thursday's session. Yesterday, the company announced a "pleasing" development concerning transvaginal mesh litigation.So what
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Woman Awarded $2.1M in Fourth Pelvic Mesh Trial
Jun 8, 2017 | The Legal Intelligencer
By P.J. D'Annunzio,
Date of Verdict:
May 26.
Court and Case No.:
C.P. Philadelphia No. 130603835.
Judge:
Arnold L. New.
Type of Action:
Products liability.
Injuries:
Pelvic pain; urinary incontinence.
Plaintiffs Counsel:
Thomas R. Kline, Kila Baldwin, Chris Gomez and Elia Robertson, of Kline & Specter, Philadelphia.
Defense Counsel:
Kenneth A. Murphy of Drinker Biddle & Reath, Philadelphia.
Comment:
A Philadelphia jury has awarded $2.1 million to a woman claiming she experienced ongoing pain resulting from the deterioration of a pelvic mesh implant.
The $2.1 million verdict in Beltz v. Ethicon came in the fourth pelvic mesh trial against Johnson & Johnson subsidiary Ethicon in the Philadelphia Court of Common Pleas. The jury handed up its verdict May 26 after 12 days of trial and nine hours of deliberation.
The verdict came just under a month after a jury handed up a $20 million verdict—including $17.5 million in punitive damages—in the third trial.
According to plaintiff Sharon Beltz's attorney, Thomas R. Kline of Kline & Specter, the 12-member jury found the Prolift mesh product was defective under the Tincher risk-utility test, answering "yes" to the question of whether the risk outweighed the cost or burden of making it safer.
"This is now our fourth consecutive Philadelphia jury verdict award [of] multimillion dollars against Johnson and Johnson for their dangerously defective transvaginal mesh products which injured tens of thousands of women, this being the second straight jury verdict relating to its dangerous Prolift product, which was withdrawn from the market in 2012," Kline said in an email. "We are pleased that Sharon Beltz, a woman from Pen Argyl, Pennsylvania, will be compensated, and expect many additional jury verdicts to follow."
Johnson & Johnson did not respond to a request for comment.
According to Beltz's pretrial memorandum, the mesh could not be removed.
http://www.thelegalintelligencer.com/id=1202789145063/Woman-Awarded-21M-in-Fourth-Pelvic-Mesh-Trial
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Adkins Pelvic Mesh Trial in Philadelphia Enters 13th Day Friday
Jun 9, 2017 | Mesh Medical Device Newsdesk
Mesh Medical Device News Desk, June 9, 2017 ~ The trial of Kimberly Adkins enters its 13th day in a Philadelphia Courtroom, focused on the Ethicon pelvic mesh product TVT-Secur, which is no longer on the market.
The trial of Kimberly Adkins v. Ethicon and Johnson & Johnson kicked off Tuesday, May 23rd in the Philadelphia Court of Common Pleas which has become the venue pitting pelvic mesh-injured women against healthcare giant, Johnson & Johnson, and its Ethicon medical device division.
In this case, on or about July 20, 2010, Kimberly Adkins was implanted with Gynecare TVT-Secur during surgery performed by Dr. George Pettit, at Southern Ohio Medical Center in Portsmouth, Ohio.
Adkins has undergone one mesh removal in September 2012.
The polypropylene mesh implant had eroded into her vagina causing pain and dyspareunia.
The Philadelphia Court of Common Pleas is the same court where jurors delivered a $20 million verdict in Engleman v. Gynecare April 28, 2017. She too was implanted with a TVT- Secur. MND coverage here.
Adkin’s law firm, Aylscock Witkin Kreis and Overholtz of Pensacola, Florida, says Ethicon rushed Secur to market despite serious concerns about the potential for a high rate of failure and complications. Internal documents show the company did not conduct randomized clinical trials before it was marketed in September 2006.
Ethicon had tested Secur on 31 women, which showed a 30 percent failure rate and 60 percent experiencing complications, according to trial documents.
Those initials results came one week before Ethicon marketed TVT-Secur.
The defense is represented by Kimberly Bueno, who according to Law 360, stressed this case is not about Ethicon’s conduct but about Adkins’ injuries. She blames Adkins’ dyspareunia on vaginal atrophy and a lack of estrogen common as women age. Her implant surgeon said they discussed the risks of erosion before surgery.
SECUR OFF THE MARKET
Secur is one of the pelvic meshes the FDA ordered to be run through randomized controlled clinical testing. Instead, in June 2012, J&J pulled Secur and three other meshes from the market, and the FDA lifted its requirement for any further testing.
This is the fifth case to go to trial in Philadelphia over allegations of defects in various pelvic mesh products made by Ethicon.
Design and manufacturing defect, a failure to warn, negligence, common law fraud, negligent misrepresentation, negligent infliction of emotional distress, breach of express and implied warranty, violation of consumer protection law, and gross negligence are all alleged. Punitive damages may be awarded.
PUNITIVE DAMAGES
If previous cases heard in this court are an indication, punitive damages could be substantial.
In the recent Engleman case, jurors delivered $17.5 million in punitive damages. In the Carlino case, heard in this Philadelphia court in February 2016, the jury awarded Sharon Carlino $13.5 million finding her TVT mesh was defective. The award includes $3.25 million in compensatory damages for her pain and suffering, $250,000 for loss of consortium to Mr. Carlino and $10 million in punitive damages.
See Mesh News Desk on the Carlino verdict here.
Patricia Hammons was awarded $12.5 million in December 2015 after jurors listened to her case against the J&J and its Prolift mesh to treat pelvic organ prolapse (POP). The award included $5.5 million in compensatory damages and $7 million in punitive damages. J&J has quietly removed Prolift from the market along with the TVT-Secur.
See Mesh News Desk on the Hammons trial here.
In the Beltz case which just concluded, jurors did not award any punitive damages but a $2.16 million verdict for Ms. Beltz.
Attorneys may argue about the net worth and profit of Secur to Ethicon, estimated to be, from 2006 through 2012, 1,725 units of TVT-Secur sold in the state of Ohio for a total of $5,619,075 in sales the total net profit was $244,157.
The audited net worth of Ethicon based on financial statement as of December 2016 was $2.7 billion. The total net worth of Johnson & Johnson for the year ending January 1, 2017, according to its 10-K annual report was $70.418 billion.
The case is Kimberly Adkins v. Ethicon Inc. et al., case number 130700919, in the Court of Common Pleas of Philadelphia County, Pennsylvania.
She is represented by Bryan Aylstock, Daniel Thornburgh and James Barger of Aylscock Witkin Kreise & Overholtz, Ben Anderson, and Lee Balefsky of Kline Specter. ###
http://www.meshmedicaldevicenewsdesk.com/adkins-pelvic-mesh-trial-philadelphia-enters-13th-day-friday/
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Here's Why Endo International plc Stock Surged Today
Jun 8, 2017 | The Motley Fool
By Cory Renauer
What happenedShares of Endo International plc (NASDAQ:ENDP), a pharmaceutical company that's been beaten down over the past couple years, rose 11.1% higher as of 3:50 p.m. EDT during Thursday's session. Yesterday, the company announced a "pleasing" development concerning transvaginal mesh litigation.So what
Last year, Endo International recorded $1.13 billion in cash distributions to settle legal disputes concerning transvaginal surgical mesh products it acquired from American Medical Systems for about $2.6 billion in 2011. That's a big chunk of change for a company that posted a $3.35 billion net loss last year.
As you can imagine, investors breathed a sigh of relief following yesterday's announcement. According to Endo, a district court judge entered a case management order that will require plaintiffs in newly filed cases concerning the pelvic repair systems to provide expert disclosures on specific causation within 120 days of filing their claims.Now what
Requiring plaintiffs to jump through an extra hoop should help Endo close the door on the disastrous purchase of American Medical Systems and return to profitability. Although the company has posted heavy net losses recently, its continuing operations generated $738 million in free cash flow during the past year.
Despite today's bump, shares of Endo International are trading at just 5.2 times trailing free cash flow. If the recently issued case management order significantly reduces the company's legal bills, and its recently launched generic drugs keep pushing up total sales, this could be a deep-value stock for courageous investors.
https://www.fool.com/investing/2017/06/08/heres-why-endo-international-plc-stock-surged-toda.aspx
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