"...recently, the Yaz line’s image has been clouded by concerns from some researchers, health advocates and plaintiffs’ lawyers. They say that the drugs put women at higher risk for blood clots, strokes and other health problems than some other birth control pills do. Those critics, though, are up against a large European health study, sponsored by Bayer, the German pharmaceutical giant, that reported the opposite conclusion. The Bayer-financed study said that cardiovascular risks in women taking Bayer products were comparable to those taking an older formula of birth control pills."
www.nytimes.com/2009/09/26/health/26contracept.html
Hmm...
Here's a blog from a law firm leading the litigation against Bayer, the company that makes Yaz:
"The risks associated with this popular birth control pill are severe; many women who took Yaz or Yasmin have died or been seriously injured because of the serious health risks associated with the drug. In fact, the FDA received over fifty reports of Yaz and Yasmin-related deaths between 2004 and 2008, most involving increased levels of potassium and occurring in women as young as 17 years old. Imagine how many went unreported! A growing number of lawsuits have been filed by or on behalf of these women, charging the drug manufacturer with inadequately warning them of the increased risks Yaz and Yasmin pose to those women who use the oral contraceptive.
While the public-at-large and many physicians may not recognize an adverse reaction to drospirenone, the health risks have been known for longer than many realize. In 2002, the British Medical Journal reported some practitioners’ concern about the drug as a result of 40 cases of venous thrombosis among women taking it. Also, in 2003, the Journal published a paper that detailed reports of thromboembolism deaths and injuries thought to be caused by Yaz and Yasmin.
www.nolan-law.com/yasmin-yaz-ocella-birth-control-injuries/#side%20effects
The FDA has been reprimanding Yaz and Yasmin manufacturers for misleading and inadequate television advertising for the drug for quite some time."
Here's Singer again... stoking the fires, fanning the flames, leading the witness...
"The health questions and the lawsuits may rattle consumer confidence, but the warnings from federal health authorities about advertising and quality control raise larger questions about Bayer’s approach to complying with government rules, said Michael A. Santoro, an associate professor at the Rutgers Business School who has studied ethics in the pharmaceutical industry. "
False Claims Act anyone? That's the fulcrum which the trial lawyers use to leverage meager findings about safety into a conspiracy of silence and misrepresentation.
I see another Avandia in the making.
