Depo-Provera Lawsuit Settlement Agreement May Resolve Eligible Meningioma Claims in MDL

The court has canceled the first trial deadlines and delayed a key legal ruling after the parties announced a global Depo-Provera settlement that may resolve thousands of meningioma lawsuits brought by women nationwide.

According to new court filings, lawyers have reached an agreement that may settle Depo-Provera lawsuits brought by women throughout the federal court system, involving the development of meningioma brain tumors from the popular birth control shot.

Depo-Provera is a long-acting contraceptive, which involves an injection of medroxyprogesterone acetate, a synthetic form of the hormone progesterone, which is given every three months.

Although Depo-Provera has been widely used for decades, a French study published in 2024 revealed that women receiving the shot face a 5x increased risk of developing an intracranial meningioma, which is a type of brain tumor that develops in the membranes surrounding the brain and spinal cord. While often non-cancerous, they can still cause serious complications when they grow large enough to press on the brain, nerves or other nearby structures. Many women diagnosed with meningioma require life-long monitoring or surgery to remove the brain tumor.

As a result of the drug makers’ failure to warn about these risks, more than 5,500 women are currently pursuing Depo-Provera meningioma lawsuits against Pfizer and related defendants. The lawsuits claim the drug makers withheld information from women and the medical community about the potential brain tumor risks, leaving users without the warnings needed to weigh the long-term dangers of the injections.

Given common questions raised in the claims, all lawsuits filed throughout the federal court system have been centralized as part of a Depo-Provera lawsuit MDL (multidistrict litigation), with U.S. District Judge M. Casey Rodgers presiding over coordinated pretrial proceedings out of the Northern District of Florida.

Judge Rodgers previously ordered the parties to prepare five “pilot” cases for early trial dates, which are designed to give participants a chance to see how juries will interpret testimony and evidence in cases that represent the majority of circumstances throughout the litigation. However, new court orders indicate the first trial deadlines have now been vacated because the parties are working to finalize a Depo-Provera lawsuit settlement agreement.

Depo-Provera Lawsuit Settlement Agreement

In a court order (PDF) issued on June 15, Judge Rodgers indicated that Plaintiffs’ Lead Counsel and defendants Pfizer Inc., Pharmacia LLC, and Pharmacia & Upjohn Co. LLC have reached a global agreement for a Depo-Provera meningioma settlement that may resolve thousands of lawsuits brought in the MDL.

Details about the Depo-Provera lawsuit settlement have not yet been publicly released, including:

• Eligibility requirements
• Potential Depo Provera settlement amounts
• How individual claims will be evaluated

Judge Rodgers noted that the parties are still working to memorialize the terms of the global MDL settlement, but indicates that only plaintiffs who meet the eligibility criteria agreed by the parties will have an opportunity to resolve their claims.

As a result of the agreement, Judge Rodgers vacated all trial and pretrial deadlines in Toney v. Pfizer Inc., one of the early cases that had been moving toward trial. The development may eliminate the immediate need for the first Depo-Provera bellwether trial, but a separate order issued the same day makes clear that the settlement agreement will not resolve every case in the MDL.

Depo-Provera Expert Hearing Still Moving Forward

In Pretrial Order No. 30A (PDF), also issued on June 15, Judge Rodgers postponed a highly anticipated ruling on Pfizer’s pending motion for summary judgment based on federal preemption, which asks the court to find that certain Depo-Provera lawsuits are barred because federal law allegedly prevented the drug makers from changing the warning label in the manner plaintiffs claim was required.

However, the court indicated that it still expects to move forward with a Rule 702 hearing over expert witness testimony on general causation, which addresses whether Depo-Provera is capable of causing meningioma brain tumors. That hearing had been scheduled for June 24 and 25, but has now been moved to July 27, 2026, in Pensacola, Florida.

The causation hearing remains important because Judge Rodgers said the global agreement, once finalized, will not resolve all cases in the MDL.

“The Court anticipates proceeding with that hearing and ruling on the Rule 702 motions in the ordinary course because the Parties’ global agreement, once finalized, will not resolve all cases in the MDL, given that only Plaintiffs who meet the eligibility criteria agreed to by the Parties will have an opportunity to participate.”

– U.S. District Judge M. Casey Rodgers, Northern District of Florida

Judge Rodgers also indicated that current MDL plaintiffs who did not seek permission to submit separate general causation experts or additional briefing will be bound by the court’s Rule 702 ruling on general causation. For cases filed or transferred into the MDL after June 15, the court will issue later orders addressing how those rulings apply, although cases filed by law firms serving in Plaintiffs’ Leadership will be bound without additional proceedings.

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