Maryland Injury and Disability Law : Washington DC Metro Injury & Disability Lawyer & Attorney : Greenberg & Bederman : Accidents, Falls, Medical Malpractice : Maryland, DC, Virginia

Yaz Lawsuits

Our Federal Court system did something very wise earlier this month. Being mindful of the fact that several lawsuits were being filed all over the country due to the harmful and even deadly side effects of Bayer’s line of birth control pills (Yaz, Yasmin and the generic version, Oscella,) all of these lawsuits were consolidated in MDL-2100, Yasmin and YAZ Marketing, Sales Practices and Products Liability Litigation.

“MDL” stands for “Multi-District Legislation,” and what this means is that several suits have been filed in multiple districts over similar circumstances. In the case of Bayer’s birth control pills, hundreds of women have been suffering from similar injuries due to blood clotting after using them.

Rather than force each individual suit to go through individual court processes in their respective districts, the Judicial Panel on Multi-district Litigation can consolidate all the pretrial work. In other words, rather than have 300 separate plaintiffs present 300 different versions of what damages they received, and rather than have 300 separate experts hired by Bayer explain why each of these 300 separate plaintiffs are mistaken about their complaints, the JPML can simply bring all the plaintiffs together under the umbrella of one group of accepted evidence.

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"I remember him. He died the same year I did." - H.L. Mencken

 To fully understand that quote, you have to understand the context in which it was said.

H.L. Mencken was the founder of The Baltimore Sun, and was easily one of the most controversial and entertaining writers of his day. In one of the world’s great ironies, Mr. Mencken suffered a stroke towards the end of his life that left him unable to read or write. It was during this period of time that he began to refer to himself in the past tense, often beginning sentences with "Back when I was alive," or "Since my death…"

Mencken was a remarkable man, especially in that he was able to very succinctly sum up exactly what that stroke did to his ability to live his life. He was a writer who was unable to write, a newspaper publisher who was unable to read the very publication that he started.

A stroke is essentially an internal wound to the brain. The causes can be either too little blood to the brain (which is called an ischemic stroke,) or too much brain in the skull (which is called a hemorrhagic stroke.) The end result of either one of these types of stroke could be paralysis or loss of muscle movement, difficulty in talking or swallowing, memory loss or difficulties in comprehension, or severe and ceaseless pain.

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 Yaz birth control side effects

Whenever you think about birth control side effects, what comes to mind?

A little bit of weight gain? A minor swelling of the breasts, or maybe breast soreness? A lightening of the period, or spotting between periods? An occasional mood swing?

These are the sorts of birth control side effects that have occurred on a pretty regular basis since the birth control pill was placed on the market. Most women and medical professionals view these issues as more of a nuisance than a detriment. And quite often, even if they do occur, the benefits of the pill seem to far outweigh the negative aspects.

But there are other side effects to the pill that don’t even belong under that category. While breast soreness and weight gain can fall under the category of “birth control side effects,” strokes, heart attacks and pulmonary embolisms certainly can’t. These injuries can at the very least be considered “birth control complications,” but if the pharmaceutical industry were to be honest, they would call them “birth control dangers.”

After all, there is a big difference between coping with gaining five pounds and learning how to live your life after a massive stroke from a birth control with severe adverse side effects. And while weight gain or other minor inconveniences are far more likely than stroke, heart attacks or pulmonary embolisms with standard, run of the mill birth control pills, the odds of a “birth control danger” happening to users of a line of birth control pills manufactured by Bayer are much higher.

The birth control pills in question go under the names “Yaz,” “Yasmin” and “Oscella.” These pills were marketed by Bayer as not only birth control pills, but also as “lifestyle choices.” The pills were sold in flashy, chic advertising campaigns that showed successful women in expensive clubs and seemingly prestigious universities touting the big differences that these pills have made to their lives.

These birth control pills were marketed as a cure for acne, and as a cure for PMS, PMDD and mood swings. It was even marketed as a “light dose” pill, which gives one the impression that you could take it without having to worry about those minor “birth control side effects” that we mentioned earlier. And while that might be the case, we are quite sure that any user of Yaz, Yasmin or Oscella would choose breast soreness over a pulmonary embolism any day of the week.

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Since Yaz, Yasmin and Oscella have been on the market, hundreds of women who use these birth control pills have been hospitalized with a medical condition called deep vein thrombosis. While that might not sound like a particularly harmful event, DVT can actually be extremely painful, and even fatal in some cases.

As the name of the condition implies, deep vein thrombosis occurs in the major veins in the legs rather than the superficial, minor veins closer to the surface of the skin. What happens is that a clot or clots develop in the major veins. Believe it or not, the clots themselves are not necessarily harmful. Your blood clots quite naturally whenever you cut yourself. But the situation becomes dangerous when the clotting mechanism gets overzealous; especially when pieces of the clots start to break off, because then they are pulled into the pulmonary circulation system.

Blood is meant to flow unimpeded. In fact, this what keeps us alive. Blood is the delivery system for oxygen to every organ in our bodies, from the heart to the lungs to the brain, and if an obstacle is placed in the path of the regular flow of blood, the results can be painful, long lasting or fatal. This is what causes strokes. This is what causes heart attacks. And this is what causes pulmonary embolisms.

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Let’s say that a company releases a product and goes on an all out marketing blitz to promote it. The company spends millions on flashy advertising featuring celebrities. They take out ads in magazines and newspapers. They consult with marketers and designers to turn the product into an “identity brand,” or a “lifestyle choice.” And all of this works. The product sells like nobody’s business.

If this product, be it a car, an energy drink or a floor cleaner had a defect in it that caused say, 6% of the users to suffer severe and painful injuries, wouldn’t you expect a massive government recall of that product? After all, cars, children’s toys and tennis shoes have been recalled for a much smaller casualty rate than 6%.

But it seems that drug companies have an exemption to facing the consequences of putting out products that could be harmful. Considering what it takes for a drug to actually be pulled from the shelves, it would seem that Merck, Pfizer, Bayer and all the other multi-billion dollar drug conglomerates are free to advertise as much and as recklessly as they please, regardless of the consequences or dangers to consumers.

Last month, the British Medical Journal released a study about incidences of blood clotting in women who use different types of birth control pills, particularly those that use an ingredient called drispirenone. This ingredient is a synthetic variation of progestin, which along with estrogen is one of the two main working parts of the birth control process.

The results of this study showed that users of drisperinone have a higher risk of venous thrombosis (or blood clots) than other forms of BCP. In fact, the report says that drisperinone has “a sixfold to sevenfold increased risk compared with non-users.”

Bear in mind that when the folks who did this study are saying “drisperinone,” they might as well be saying “Yaz,” “Yasmin,” or “Ocella,” as these are the only pills on the market that actually use drisperinone as an ingredient. But if you took a look at the initial advertising blitz that took place when Bayer marketed the pills, you wouldn’t know that there was anything wrong with it at all.

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Yaz Side Effects

One Health Forum, Multiple Injured Women

Most threads on internet message boards don’t last that long. Rampant discussion over things like the latest plot twist on Desperate Housewives only last until the next episode. Same with things like professional sports injuries, or even political scandals.

It isn’t surprising that our collective attention span has dropped, especially when you consider how quickly news and rumors circulate on the internet. As soon as something is new it is instantly on its way to becoming old.

But we recently came across a message board with a thread that has maintained a steady stream of posts and replies since the topic was first posted in June of 2007. The topic is entitled “Yaz Side Effects,” and it is on ehealthforum.com.

You can check the news and read about all the lawsuits that have been filed, and you can read about how the FDA has been cracking down on Bayer’s line of birth control pills, but if you really want to get an idea of how this faulty drug is impacting regular people like you or me, you should take a look at how this topic thread has progressed since it started.

The original post of the thread was this:

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 Yaz Health Alert

The birth control pill was first approved for sale and marketing as an oral contraceptive in 1960. The release of this pill did not pass unnoticed. Since the passing of the Comstock Laws in 1873, the sale of any method of birth control device, be it a condom, IUD or diaphragm, was illegal. Even by the mid-1950’s these laws were still on the books in thirty states, which, combined with the cultural philosophies of the times, left women in very narrow personal and professional roles. A life of marriage and child rearing was considered the true calling for all women, both due to societal pressures and the laws on the books. In Massachusetts and Connecticut for example, the use of any form of birth control was punishable by fines or prison terms.

The company that released Enovid was so terrified of a boycott by Catholic Americans that they initially marketed it as a treatment for menstrual disorders rather than a pill that prevented pregnancy. But it was the sort of marketing that was done with a wink and a nod, and within two years the number of women who were taking Enovid was at 500,000.

In May of 1960 the FDA allowed Enovid to be marketed solely as a contraceptive, without the socially acceptable camouflage of menstrual problems providing cover against the Catholic Church and others who fundamentally disagreed with the notion of birth control.

It can be said with certainty that the birth control pill altered practically everything about gender dynamics in the United States. Women were no longer at the mercy of biology. Women could develop careers without worrying about having to leave them before they were ready. Women could have children when they wanted to as opposed to having them whether they liked it or not.

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