Supreme Court rules Drug Companies exempt from Lawsuits

Originally posted by halfmask
I have always been paranoid of the pharmaceutical companies and their products, but now its justified. I will be avoiding as much medication as I can.

A very wise move.

Too many believe that these corporations are their friends that are there to help them, but that is not so.

They exist to make money, and like all businesses, they are constantly looking for more ways to gain more long term customers.

The scary part is that, obviously, they will design their drugs to cause damage to a person's health in the future. Many drugs are designed to cause harm if the user ever stops taking them. Then the pharma companies say "see what happens if you stop taking your medication"! And ironically, they're right...

reply to post by Bluesma


Interesting point. I know it is like that for a whole lot of non brand name products, the same company makes the product, yet it doesn't have the brand and is suddenly worth half the price ..... It wouldn't surprise me to see the same practice in the pharm industry.

Looks like the Drug Industry owns the Supreme court , so they can put all kinds of reagents in these pills....

and if some one dies because they have medications full of toxics , the company making these meds will walk away EVEN if they put this stuff in with the intention to kill.

exempt from lawsuits sounds like untouchable or being god.

So now the government has made it LEGAL to Murder via medication.

again i wonder , what did we average citizens do ?? or are they just so paranoid ??

i miss the line it is for national security purpose you may not ask questions.

TheGreazel.

Originally posted by TKDRL
reply to post by Bluesma

 

Interesting point. I know it is like that for a whole lot of non brand name products, the same company makes the product, yet it doesn't have the brand and is suddenly worth half the price

..... It wouldn't surprise me to see the same practice in the pharm industry.

Well, when they come out with the developed medication, they get a patent on it- they retain the right to market it and nobody else can. But this is limited in time, and at some point, years later, the patent is up and anyone can then start marketing it too. That's when generics step in.

It is easily expected that most drug companies would get the idea to have generic companies also, so that once the patent is gone, they don't just lose sales to others.

But the patenting process is supposed to allow them to have time to make up for the investments they put into the development and research. (and, in the US, advertising and promotion. Though that is illegal in some other countries).

I looked it up, and yup it's for real. Wow, just wow.. How damn RIDICULOUS.

So, the next time a drug company makes an error of some sort and a bad 'batch' of medication comes out (or something of the sort) and a person (or multiple people) experience irreversible damage to their bodies due to this, they can't sue.. Wow.

Originally posted by TheIceQueen
I looked it up, and yup it's for real. Wow, just wow.. How damn RIDICULOUS.

So, the next time a drug company makes an error of some sort and a bad 'batch' of medication comes out (or something of the sort) and a person (or multiple people) experience irreversible damage to their bodies due to this, they can't sue.. Wow.

That's not what the ruling says at all. It says that if the generic company is making the drug exactly the same as the original company (which was approved by the FDA), then the generic company is not the one liable if the drug is causing problems. In this particular case, there was even a warning of this rare, but possible side-effect on the drug box. There are many, many, many people who have taken this drug (generic AND brand name) who had no major side-effect at all.

Originally posted by TheIceQueen
I looked it up, and yup it's for real. Wow, just wow.. How damn RIDICULOUS.

So, the next time a drug company makes an error of some sort and a bad 'batch' of medication comes out (or something of the sort) and a person (or multiple people) experience irreversible damage to their bodies due to this, they can't sue.. Wow.

I don't know if you looked it up, but if you did, you forgot to read it....

reply to post by halfmask


Found the case for you: www.law.cornell.edu...

The drug in question is sulindac, a NSAID (non-steroidal anti-inflammatory drug). Basically, a beefed up variant of aspirin along the lines of aleve or advil.

From what I could gather, the Supreme Court first centered on the fact that the drug was approved by the FDA to be "safe for use" and relied heavily upon that. Overall, the majority opinion was based on pre-emption (federal law trumps state) and that federal law prevents drug manufacturers from independently altering the labeling of a drug. Alito went so far as to say that the award and dissenting opinions were based on "passion" due to the grievous injuries. I'm a little baffled at how the pharmaceutical company could avoid strict liability on the matter. If you have a product that, while used appropriately, causes grievous injury, the company is generally liable last I checked. However, the majority opinion also relied on the fact that the drug was approved as safe by the FDA. Well, I can cite a whole lot of cases that a drug was approved as safe by the FDA when it was most certainly not. (Hell, I'm a DES daughter.) The FDA is most certainly not infallible.

Pretty disturbing outcome and I wholeheartedly agree with Sotomayer's dissenting opinion where she states that they are providing a loophole to escape liability. If you make a product that, through appropriate use, causes grievous harm, you should be responsible. Period. At least that's what I learned when I took business law.

PS. I saw nothing in the majority opinion that relied upon the drug's generic status. The manufacturer was Mutual.

A country the size and scope of the USA, i expect the odd shocking revealation or scandal to come out every now and again..it's obvious things will go arse about face once in a while...but it's EVERY bloody day lately!

What the hell has happened to America? Don't bother answering, it's clear your country has been stolen while you were looking the other way...if i were you, i'd be looking at ways to steal it back again.

Unless your life depends on it, don't use pharma products.

Use herbal alternatives.

Simple.

See if you can spot the blur of the pharma corps racing to win your 'custom' back after they lose 50 - 80% of their drug dealing profits.

Just say NO kids. I most certainly say no every single time. Pharma needs us..we certainly don't need them.

Originally posted by kaylaluv

Originally posted by TheIceQueen
I looked it up, and yup it's for real. Wow, just wow.. How damn RIDICULOUS.

So, the next time a drug company makes an error of some sort and a bad 'batch' of medication comes out (or something of the sort) and a person (or multiple people) experience irreversible damage to their bodies due to this, they can't sue.. Wow.

That's not what the ruling says at all. It says that if the generic company is making the drug exactly the same as the original company (which was approved by the FDA), then the generic company is not the one liable if the drug is causing problems. In this particular case, there was even a warning of this rare, but possible side-effect on the drug box. There are many, many, many people who have taken this drug (generic AND brand name) who had no major side-effect at all.

edit on 11-7-2013 by kaylaluv because: (no reason given)

Which in itself points to manufacturing process, and not original ingredients being the cause of including a flesh-eating bacterium in the pills.

A typical scenario would be contaminated production lines, or an infected worker lacking in proper hygiene procedures, or something of that nature.

We have had a terrible time with these so-called 'flesh-eating superbugs' here in the UK..very, very, VERY nasty bugs that can't be stopped with conventional antibiotics.

If the flesh eating bacteria came from the production line, at any stage of manufacture of the generic version, then that most definitely IS the responsibility of the generic manufacturer.

Either way, we're now in a situation where as each day goes by, another erosion of citizens power in favour of corporate power.

Vaccine manufacturers (pharma again) are closing (or have now closed) the route to litigation if they happen to kill you or your family, or leave you a crippled vegetable...can't sue them.

GMO manufacturers, like Monsanto have government protection from lawsuits, in the form of the 'MPA' or Monsanto Protection Act....if the crud masquerading as food kills or harms you and your family...can't sue them.

Take a generic drug, get injured by it, even if the injury was not a result of the original ingredients - but rather a foreign contaminate in the factory or supply line? Now you know you can't sue them either.

What a bloody world.

reply to post by MysterX


Her affliction wasn't necrotizing fasciitis, but toxic epidermal necrolysis. I have no background in medicine but even a cursory look at the Wikipedia pages for these ailments suggests TEN is not caused by bacteria or other infectious agents.

The woman did win her case, quite a while ago- she was awarded millions.

But it still stirred up the problem of federal and state laws opposing each other concerning generics.

Originally posted by WhiteAlice

Pretty disturbing outcome and I wholeheartedly agree with Sotomayer's dissenting opinion where she states that they are providing a loophole to escape liability. If you make a product that, through appropriate use, causes grievous harm, you should be responsible. Period. At least that's what I learned when I took business law.

PS. I saw nothing in the majority opinion that relied upon the drug's generic status. The manufacturer was Mutual.

She was prescribed Clinoril, the brand name version of sulindac, the pharmacist gave her a generic form by Mutual. At the time this happened, no warning about this possible side effect was on the brand name packaging, so Mutual couldn't have any on theirs either.

Mutual was unable to change sulindac’s composition as a matter of both federal law and basic chemistry, New Hampshire’s design-defect cause of action effectively required Mutual to change sulindac’s labeling to provide stronger warnings. But, as this Court recognized just two Terms ago in PLIVA, Inc. v. Mensing, 564 U. S. ___ (2011), federal law prohibits generic drug manufacturers from independently changing their drugs’ labels. Accordingly, state law imposed a duty on Mutual not to comply with federal law.

Originally posted by CaticusMaximus
5 to 4, eh? Makes it easy to tell which 5 judges are in the back pockets of wallstreet and big money.

Wonder how much each of them were bribed for....

I think at this point, the corruption in America is nearing absolute completion. I just see no other alternate scenario occurring here.

Fascism isnt coming.

Its here.

edit on 7/9/2013 by CaticusMaximus because: grammar

Quoted for TRUTH!

Mussolini's dream happened, Ronald Reagan helped make it with the collapse of the Soviet Union.

Derek