Paragard MDL Judge Indicates First Bellwether Trial Will Move Forward as Scheduled

First of three Paragard IUD lawsuits is expected to go before a jury on January 20, involving claims by a woman who had to have fragments of the implant surgically removed from her uterus after it fractured during removal.

A federal judge has rejected a last minute attempt by Teva to prevent the first Paragard IUD lawsuit from going before a jury later this month, indicating that the manufacturer must wait until after a final judgment is entered in the case before pursuing any appeal of earlier pretrial rulings issued in the case.

Currently scheduled to begin on January 20, 2026, the trial will be the first of more than 3,700 Paragard lawsuits filed in federal courts nationwide to go before a jury. It will also be the first opportunity for evidence and testimony expected to be repeated across thousands of similar cases to be heard in open court.

The Paragard is a copper-based intrauterine device (IUD) designed to provide long-term birth control and prevent pregnancy for up to a decade. Despite Teva Pharmaceuticals marketing the implant as a safe and reversible form of contraception, the lawsuits allege that the Paragard is prone to breaking under the stress of the removal process, resulting in pieces of the device being imbedded into the uterus.

This can lead to the need for invasive surgical procedures to retrieve the fragments, as well as pain, bleeding, fertility complications and other long-term injuries. Each of the complaints indicates the manufacturer failed to provide adequate warnings to women and the medical community about these risks and failed to design the device in a way that it could be easily removed, in addition to not instructing doctors how to properly remove them.

Due to common questions of fact and law, the Paragard lawsuits have been consolidated into a multidistrict litigation (MDL) under U.S. District Judge Leigh Martin May in the Northern District of Georgia for coordinated discovery and pretrial proceedings.

Earlier in the litigation, Judge May directed the parties to focus on preparing a small group of representative cases for early trial dates, to help them gauge how juries are likely to react to certain evidence and expert witness testimony that will be repeated throughout the litigation. Last February, she announced the selection of three Paragard IUD bellwether lawsuits for early test trials.

Last month, Judge May announced that the first Paragard bellwether trial would begin on January 20, involving claims filed by Pauline Rickard, who indicates she suffered significant pain, suffering, loss of reproductive health, permanent impairment and disfigurement due to the need to remove broken parts of a Paragard IUD from her body.

Earlier this month, the judge reaffirmed that schedule in a January 12 order (PDF), rejecting a motion by the manufacturer to delay the trial.

According to Teva’s motion, it planned to file an interlocutory appeal, seeking to have the case dismissed through summary judgment. The company asked Judge May, who had already refused to dismiss the case herself, to wait until the Eleventh Circuit Court of Appeals could review the decisions.

Judge May indicated that the company failed to ask a “controlling question of law,” and that even a successful appeal would not move the litigation toward the termination of the entire MDL and all three of the bellwether claims.

While the outcome of the Paragard bellwether trials will not have any binding impact on these other claimants, the cases are expected to have a large influence on any negotiations for a potential global Paragard IUD settlement that would avoid the need for each individual case to be remanded back to U.S. District Courts nationwide for individual trial dates in the coming years.

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