A linchpin of the preemption analysis in Wyeth v. Levine, 2009 WL 529172 (U.S. March 4, 2009), was the Court’s discussion of the “changes being effected” regulation, id. at *7-8, which in turn depended on the existence of either “newly acquired information” or “new analyses of previously submitted data.” Id. at *7. Factually, there
We can’t say much, because Herrmann’s on the road and Bexis is involved in the litigation, but a trial court in New Jersey just denied certification of an individual consumer economic loss class action, both nationwide and limited to New Jersey. The bases of the decision:
There is no predominance. “The causal nexus between the
This is not really new news.
Herrmann (and co-authors) published “The Class Action Fairness Act: An Ill-Conceived Approach to Class Settlements” a couple of years ago in the Tulane Law Review and “Making Class Actions Work: The Untapped Potential of the Internet” more recently in the University of Pittsburgh Law Review.
The new news is
One silver lining from the severe pruning that prescription drug preemption took in Wyeth v. Levine, is that there may now be less incentive to expand the common-law liability of pioneer manufacturers in generic drug cases – something we’ve discussed in posts that readers can find under the “product identification” “generic drug” and “Conte”
As you know, we watch the medical device preemption cases.
But here’s a Riegel wrinkle. (In fact, we like this case so much that we might call it
Blogging makes you psycho. (Frankly, we didn’t have that far to go even before we started blogging.)
Not only do you want to break stories on the web, you want to be among the first to comment in the print media, too.
The two of us thus teamed up to write a piece for today’s
We know that headline is boring: “Accutane: McCarrell Remanded For New Trial.”
But give us a break.
Levine comes down. We’re duty-bound to blog about it. The press calls for reactions to it. We’re writing about the case in print media. We’re being asked to speak about the case.
And then there’s our real jobs:
Last month, the web was ablaze with speculation about whether Chief Justice Roberts would recuse himself from Wyeth v. Levine, because the Chief owns stock in Pfizer, and Pfizer had announced its intention to acquire Wyeth. Coverage of that issue appeared here, here, and here, among other places.
Here’s what the Chief
So far, we’ve learned of the following upcoming webinars with panels analyzing the implications of Wyeth v. Levine:
On Friday, March 27, at noon Eastern, the Defense Research Institute presents “Supreme Court’s Preemption Decision in Wyeth v. Levine,” featuring Michael Davis and Rebecca Wood (both of Sidley Austin), who wrote an amicus brief in
We’ve decided to blog on a less depressing preemption subject than Wyeth v. Levine today. We’ve seen a couple of recent medical device preemption cases that just about bookend the field. In Hofts v. Howmedica Osteonics Corp., 2009 WL 331470 (S.D. Ind. Jan. 12, 2009), the court found just about as little preemption (and