Drugs - Products Liability

Guide to Perez v. Wyeth Laboratories Inc., 161 N.J. 1, 734 A.2d 1245 (N.J. 1999)

Who are the defendants?

Why was Dow Corning a defendant?

What is the nostalgic view of health care the judge starts with?

How was the physician seen in this view?

How did drug companies promote prescription drugs?

Why legal doctrine did this spawn?

How has this changed?

What about the allergy ad?

What did Bob Dole have to say?

What is the question in this case?

How does the phrasing of the question tell you what the result is going to be?

What is the Norplant system and how does it work?

What does the court say about truth of the plaintiff's claims?

Why is it important for the court to say this?

How was Norplant advertised?

Did the ads include warnings?

What does plaintiff claim are the consequences of taking Norplant?

Is this a class action?

What issue did the plaintiff's want resolved?

What is the formal process for choosing bellwether plaintiffs?

What is the derivation of bellwether?

What must the trial court do before generalizing from a bellwether case to a group of cases?

What did the trial court say about the learned intermediary?

What is the effect of that ruling when combined with N.J.S.A. 2A:58C-4?

What was the issue with scarring in the bellwether cases?

What was the final ruling by the trial court?

What does Section 6(d) of the Restatement provide?

What does NJSA 2A:58C-4 provide?

What did the appeals court assume about who would be a learned intermediary?

What did this court say was the holding in Feldman?

What did Davis v. Wyeth say about the learned intermediary?

What about oral contraceptives?

What about travel vaccines?

How is Norplant a hybrid?

What brought us direct to the consumer marketing?

How did the ads target their audience?

How is the poetic justice for men?

What is the Claritin ad that is discussed?

How much did drug companies spend on advertising in 1997?

Is that really a lot?

How big was the health care budget that year?

What is the problem with these ads?

How did the Restatement of Torts (Third) handle this?

Under the NJ Products Liability Act, what is the legal effect of giving an FDA approved warning?

What did the legislative history of the Act say that the defendant relied on?

Why does the court say it cannot just wait for the legislature?

What did Judge Wisdom say about the role of the physician as learned intermediary?

What are Professor's Noah's four factors supporting the learned intermediary?

How does the court refute each of the four factors?

What has the Fifth Circuit ruled in the Norplant cases?

What did the Mass court say about contraceptives? (NB - there is also a federal law that requires warning consumers about contraceptives.)

How have changes in the standard for informed consent undermined the rationale for the learned intermediary doctrine?

How did the court use Henningsen v. Bloomfield to support its analysis?

What should Wyeth have done to preserve the learned intermediary defense?

How does the FDA Draft Guidance provide for informing consumers who see television ads?

How is the Internet affecting this, in the court's view?

What is the legal effect of the manufacturer complying with the FDA directive?

What does this mean that the plaintiff's attorney must do to get to the jury and to prevail?

What is the causation problem in failure to warn cases?

How is this like informed consent?

How is the policy different in a products case than in an informed consent case?

What is the effect of the learned intermediary in causation?

What evidence does the court give for rejecting the traditional application of the learned intermediary doctrine to causation?

Does the court think physicians have just become prescription pushers?

When is the manufacturer off the hook, even though it did not provide adequate information to the physician?

How does the court use the diabetic patient example to illustrate its ruling?

How can the defendant protect itself in this example?

What is the final ruling? (hint - figure out what paragraph 111 means to the plaintiff's attorney)