Woman Suffered Extensive Bone Loss after using Depo-Provera
The Quebec Superior Court has given approval for a class-action lawsuit against the pharmaceutical company Pfizer Inc. and its subsidiary, Pfizer Canada Inc. regarding their contraceptive drug Depo-Provera. Depo-Provera is an injection administered every three months that can be used to treat women with endometriosis and breast and endometrial cancer in menopausal women as well as used as a contraceptive. The $50 million class action suit claims that Pfizer knew that Depo-Provera could cause a decrease in bone density in women using it. The representative plaintiff, Noelia Brito, had her bone density tested seven years after she began using the drug. The test revealed that the 37-year-old had the bone density of a 70-year-old. In a June 2005, public notice, Pfizer admitted that two clinical studies indicated that women using Depo-Provera might be subject to a considerable reduction in their bone mineral density. Daniel Belleau, who is representing the plaintiffs, guessed that possibly thousands of women will come forward in the lawsuit because in the last five years, 3 million prescriptions for Depo-Provera have been filled. While it has long been known that Depo-Provera causes bone loss, it has been discovered that the bone loss grows worse the longer the drug is used and may remain long after the injections stopped and could even be irreversible. For these reasons the FDA in agreement with Pfizer in November 2004 agreed to put a black box warning on the label. Pfizer and the FDA recommend that Depo-Provera not be used for longer than 2 years due to concerns over bone loss. Regardless of the steps taken to protect women with the black box warning long after its initial approval and release, Pfizer allegedly knew of the bone loss and released it for general consumption. Depo-Provera was approved by the FDA in 1992.
