Toxic Injury

December 21, 2009

Jury orders BP to pay $100 M for Exposing Workers to Toxic Substances

BP must pay more than $100 million in damages for exposing contract workers to toxic substances at its Texas City oil refinery in April 2007, a federal jury in Galveston said in the latest setback for the troubled plant.

The mammoth verdict arose out of a case brought by a BP contractor who claimed the British oil giant’s failure to maintain equipment and provide adequate safety controls led to a poisonous chemical release that sent more than 100 workers to area hospitals on the evening of April 19, 2007.

The company said it was “shocked and outraged” by the jury’s decision and vowed to appeal.

December 15, 2009

Lawsuit Filed Against Talc Producers For Cancer Link,

by Dr. Shezad Malik

A Sioux Falls woman is accusing Johnson and Johnson and two mining companies of failing for decades to warn consumers about a link between ovarian cancer and talcum powder.

Deane Berg, 52, applied talc-based body powder to her perineum each day after showering from 1975 to 2007, she says in a federal lawsuit filed last week. She contracted ovarian cancer in 2006.

Berg maintains that talc caused her cancer and that the companies selling the mineral knew there was a risk but failed to warn the public.

December 7, 2009

Fort Worth Texas Yaz Yasmin Birth Control Lawsuit Update

by Dr. Shezad Malik

After 13 hours of intensifying pain, two trips to the emergency room and two CT scans, doctors finally found what was ailing Lottie Green.

In her left lung, the pulmonologist told her, was the largest blood clot they had ever seen and there were others in her right lung as well, she said.

Soon after the 41-year-old Bethesda, Md., resident was released from a hospital last month, Ms. Green joined hundreds of other women in lawsuits against Germany’s Bayer AG, the maker of the popular oral contraceptive Yaz.

December 6, 2009

FDA Review Says MRI Imaging Drugs That Contain Gadolinium Riskier for Kidney Patients

by Dr. Shezad Malik

The U.S. Food & Drug Administration is weighing further regulation of three drugs used to create high-contrast images on MRI scans, based on a new analysis that suggests they carry a higher risk of causing a rare, but potentially fatal disease.

The issue, marks a setback for GE Healthcare (GE), which contends that its product is no riskier than competing imaging drugs. FDA reviewers said GE’s drug, Omniscan, had a disproportionately high number of reports of the disease compared with its peers.

December 5, 2009

Public Citizen Asks FDA to Ban Weight Loss Pill

by Dr. Shezad Malik

A consumer advocacy group is petitioning the government to ban the weight loss pill Meridia because a recent study suggests it increases risk of heart attack, stroke and death.

A letter Thursday from Public Citizen calls on the Food and Drug Administration to pull Abbott Laboratories’ drug from the U.S. market, where it is used by roughly a quarter million people.

Preliminary results from a 10,000-patient study — known as the SCOUT study — showed a slightly higher risk of heart-related problems in patients taking Meridia, also called sibutramine, compared with a dummy pill. Patients in the study were older than 55, overweight with a history of heart disease or diabetes.

December 4, 2009

Guard Commander Said KBR Carcinogen Caused his Cancer

by Dr. Shezad Malik

A funeral is set for a retired Indiana National Guard commander who testified in October that exposure to a lethal carcinogen in Iraq caused his cancer.

Lt. Col. James C. Gentry, 52, Williams, Ind., died of lung cancer. His death is a marker in a pending federal lawsuit; his life inspired a federal bill working its way through Congress.

December 4, 2009

Asbestos Mesothelioma Payout System is Being Questioned

by Dr. Shezad Malik

Once upon a time, asbestos was practically everywhere. Because the material causes devastating forms of cancer and lung disease, huge product-liability litigation sprung up. That led to huge settlements, which led to the establishment of huge trusts, created to assure payment to millions of current and future claimants.

Some $20 billion now resides in these 40 or so trusts, set up by Johns Manville Corp., Owens Corning and other former makers and sellers of asbestos. But who’s overseeing the trusts? Is the money getting spent properly? In short, are the trusts working as designed?

November 26, 2009

Philip Morris Ordered to Pay $300 M to Smoker

by Dr. Shezad Malik

A Florida jury ordered cigarette maker Philip Morris USA to pay $300 million in damages to a 61-year-old ex-smoker named Cindy Naugle who is wheelchair-bound by emphysema.

The Broward Circuit Court jury assessed $56.6 million in past and future medical expenses against the company, part of Altria Group Inc, as well as $244 million in punitive damages.

The verdict is the largest of the so-called Engle progeny cases that have been tried so far, both sides said.

Philip Morris will seek further review of the verdict because of “numerous erroneous rulings by the trial judge,” Philip Morris spokesman Murray Garnick said in a statement.

November 21, 2009

Jury Awards $12M in Verizon Toxic Waste Lawsuit

by Dr. Shezad Malik

Two men who became seriously ill after working at a Hicksville magazine distributor located atop a former nuclear fuel plant have been awarded $12 million in a federal negligence lawsuit against Verizon Communications Inc.

Gerard DePascale, and Liam Neville, each were awarded $5 million, and DePascale’s wife, Joanne, $2 million, after their lawyers successfully argued the men were sickened by toxins that remained at the site years after operations ceased in 1967.

November 19, 2009

Dominican Republic blames U.S.Power Company for Birth Defects

by Dr. Shezad Malik

Maximiliano Calcaño is 2 and was born with no arms. Maximiliano’s mother, Anajai Calcaño, lives in a small house with no indoor plumbing in a rural village in northern Dominican Republic, not far from where coal ash generated by Virginia-based AES Corp. wound up at the edge of the sea.

More than 50,000 tons of coal ash laden with heavy metals was left at a port abutting local homes for years while the company, politicians, prosecutors, environmental activists and bureaucrats argued — and residents got sick.