Those Silenced by Manufacturers of Ortho Evra
In a recent Bloomberg Health News article the company speculated that pharmaceutical company Johnson & Johnson has spent as much as $68.7 million in settlements over its birth control patch Ortho Evra. While that amount may be staggering to some, the settlements prevent the victims or their families and their lawyers to speak about it. Without foreknowledge of a products possible danger how can future potential victims make an informed choice? The settlements included 20 young women who died as a direct result of the patch and a staggering 1,330 victims are part of a class-action lawsuit currently being litigated in Ohio. As many as 4,000 complaints have been filed concerning the controversial patch and yet Johnson & Johnson refuses to pull it from pharmacy shelves. The consumer advocacy group Public Citizen has gone so far as to ask the U.S. Food and Drug Administration to recall the birth control patch. By every indication the manufacturer J&J certainly has no plans to safeguard women’s lives and voluntarily recall it themselves. The decision to continue to sell it indicates that the company may not have their consumers’ best interest at heart and that money is the driving factor, not responsible pharmaceutical treatment.
