Depo-Provera Multidistrict Litigation (MDL) Established for Meningioma Lawsuits Filed Throughout Federal Court System

The U.S. JPML has consolidated all Depo Provera lawsuits before U.S. District Judge Casey Rodgers in the Northern District of Florida, for coordinated discovery and pretrial proceedings.

The U.S. Judicial Panel on Multidistrict Litigation (JPML) has decided to transfer all Depo-Provera meningioma lawsuits brought throughout the federal court system to the Northern District of Florida, where one U.S. District Judge will usher the litigation through discovery and pretrial proceedings, and help facilitate a potential settlement or other resolution for the claims.

A rapidly growing number of nearly identical lawsuits have been filed in various different U.S. District Courts over the past six months, since studies were published last year that found a link between meningioma and Depo-Provera shots, with each of the claims raising similar allegations that the drug maker knew or should have known about the brain tumor risks for years.

Depo-Provera was first introduced by Pfizer in 1992, as a quarterly birth control injection. Amid aggressive marketing that has suggested the “Depo shot” is safe and effective, it has been used by more than 70 million women over the past three decades.

However, concerns about Depo-Provera meningioma side effects emerged in April 2024, following the publication of new data that found women receiving the birth control shot may face a five-fold greater risk of developing brain tumors.

This has already resulted in nearly 70 meningioma lawsuits being filed against Pfizer and other generic manufacturers in at least 15 different U.S. District Courts nationwide.  However, the size and scope of the litigation is expected to continue to expand throughout 2025, as more women learn that they may have developed a brain tumor from the Depo-Provera shot.

Since each of the complaints raise similar questions of fact and law, a group of plaintiffs filed a motion in November 2024, asking the U.S. JPML to create a Depo-Provera Multidistrict Litigation (MDL), to reduce duplicate discovery into common issues in the claims, avoid conflicting pretrial rulings from different judges and to serve the convenience of common witnesses, parties and the judicial system.

Plaintiffs originally asked that the MDL be assigned to one judge in the Northern District of California, where a large number of early claims were filed.

Pfizer and other defendants also supported consolidation, but argued it would be more appropriate to centralize the claims in the Southern District of New York, near Pfizer’s headquarters.

Following oral arguments held last week, the JPML issued a transfer order (PDF) on Friday, choosing neither location. The panel instead assigned the Depo-Provera MDL to U.S District Judge M. Casey Rodgers in the Northern District of Florida, which was the plaintiffs’ alternative venue.

“The Northern District of Florida is an appropriate transferee district for this litigation. Two related actions are pending in this district, which offers the necessary judicial resources and expertise to manage this nationwide litigation in an efficient and convenient manner,” the panel wrote. “Judge M. Casey Rodgers, to whom we assign this MDL, is an able jurist with extensive and exceptional experience presiding over large products liability MDLs. We are confident that she will steer this litigation on a prudent and expeditious course.”

Judge Rodgers recently oversaw pretrial proceedings for lawsuits filed by nearly 300,000 current or former U.S. military members who said defective 3M earplugs caused them to suffer hearing loss and tinnitus, which causes a ringing in the ears. That litigation ended in a nearly $6 billion settlement agreement in March 2024.

Now that the Depo-Provera lawsuits have been consolidated into an MDL, all current and future claims brought in any federal court will be transferred to Judge Rodgers for coordinated discovery, pretrial motions and potentially a series of early bellwether test trials.

However, if the parties fail to reach a Depo-Provera MDL settlement or another resolution after all pretrial proceedings are concluded, each individual meningioma lawsuit may later be remanded back to the U.S. District Court where it was initially filed for an individual trial in the future.