Dozens of Zoloft Cases Should Be Remanded to State Court: Lawyers

According to motions filed this week in opposition to Pfizer’s attempt to consolidate all Zoloft birth defect cases pending in federal court, lawyers representing many of the plaintiffs indicate that dozens of the lawsuits identified by the drug maker were improperly removed from state court systems.

Last month, Pfizer filed a motion with the U.S. Judicial Panel on Multidistrict Litigation asking for the consolidation of about 59 Zoloft cases pending in various federal district courts throughout the United States. The drug maker is asking that the cases be centralized before one judge in the Southern District of New York for pretrial proceedings as part of an MDL, or multidistrict litigation.

In responses filed by several lawyers representing many families of children born with birth defects from Zoloft use by the mother during pregnancy, plaintiffs argue that Pfizer is attempting to move the lawsuits to a venue that it considers more favorable by improperly removing dozens of cases from state court, creating the false impression that there are more cases than there really are in the federal court system.

It is estimated that 49 of the 59 cases involving Zoloft injuries identified by Pfizer should be remanded back to state courts where they were originally filed, according to filings.

Most of these Zoloft lawsuits were originally filed in the Philadelphia Court of Common Pleas against Pfizer and Wolters Kluwer Health, Inc., a Pennsylvania-based company that was allegedly responsible for the patient education monograph (PEM) that was included with Zoloft prescriptions. Therefore, plaintiffs argue that the cases were wrongfully removed to federal court based on a lack of diversity with Wolters Kluwer Health.

A number of other cases involving both Pfizer and Wolters Kluwer Health are still pending in Pennsylvania state court, with some already scheduled for trial dates in 2013. In addition, at least one of those cases was previously removed by Pfizer to federal court and has already been remanded back to state court due to the fact that Wolters Kluwer Health is a defendant.

Plaintiffs argue that an MDL should not be formed, as it would reward Pfizer for artificially creating a number of federal lawsuits. In the alternative, if the panel does decide to form a Zoloft MDL, the plaintiffs propose that the litigation should be centralized in the U.S. District Court for the Eastern District of Pennsylvania or that all cases involving Wolters Kluwer Health should be excluded from the MDL pending a resolution of motions to remand.

Zoloft (sertraline) was introduced by Pfizer in 1991 for the treatment of depression, obsessive-compulsive disorder and anxiety. By 2007 there were nearly 30 million prescriptions, making it the most prescribed antidepressant in the United States. Zoloft belongs to a class of drugs known as selective serotonin reuptake inhibitors (SSRIs).

In recent years, a growing amount of research and adverse event reports have suggested that use of Zoloft during pregnancy may increase the risk of serious and potentially life-threatening health problems for babies, including persistent pulmonary hypertension in newborns (PPHN), spina bifida, heart defects, lung defects, abdominal defects, cranial defects and other malformations.

Studies have suggested that Zoloft may increase the risk of birth defects when used as early as the first trimester of pregnancy, a time when many women do not even know they are pregnant.

The U.S. Judicial Panel on Multidistrict Litigation is expected to hear oral arguments on the motion to consolidate the Zoloft cases on March 29, at a hearing scheduled at the Edward J. Schwartz U.S. Courthouse in San Diego, California.