We recently recapped the law relating to when experts are allowed to opine on what was in the head of another and how a pending Supreme Court criminal case might affect things. In our area, this issue comes up most frequently in the context of plaintiff experts trying to offer their spin about how the
For much of the sixteen and a half years of this Blog, we have been tracking the acceptance and rejection of the learned intermediary doctrine. The first year that we compiled a worst decisions of the year list it was topped by a case that still holds the title for worst, most thinly veiled legislation
Maybe we have been doing this too long. Or maybe, like the prequels, spinoffs, and reboots that are so prevalent among streaming entertainment options, there is just a lot of repetition. In serial product liability cases, we hope that repetition leads to consistency of results or at least predictable rules of the game. Consider the
In addition to having Green Mountains, maple syrup, lake houses, an ice cream company run by summer camp buddies, a mitten wearing Senator, and a history of low COVID rates, Vermont has a history of being a legal outlier. Some of its positions might be considered progressive or regressive. The legislation discussed here is a
In very general terms, posts on specific court opinions fall into three categories: 1) ones we think are correct, 2) ones we think are incorrect, and 3) ones we think are mixed bags. Not terribly profound. Digging a bit deeper, we sometimes pick cases to discuss because we feel the need to vent about the
Devoted as we are to the defense of manufacturers of prescription drugs and medical devices, we have often advocated for the full implication of the fundamental—to us, at least—requirements that warnings claims focus on the decision making of the learned intermediary and that proximate cause matters. One implication is that heeding presumptions typically make little sense for claims about these products. It is one thing to say that a plaintiff should be allowed to proceed with a warnings claim when a prescriber is truly unavailable to provide testimony—like by dying before the plaintiff knew he had a claim—and the alleged missing warning would have clearly contraindicated the plaintiff from receiving the prescription product. In such a case, it might make sense to presume, absent contrary evidence, that the physician would have heeded the warning and not prescribed the product to the plaintiff. In just about every other prescription drug and device case we can imagine, the heeding presumption does not make sense.
We feel the same way about a post-sale duty to warn. Not only do such duties run contrary to the typical focus in warnings cases on the notice to the manufacturer of potential risks before the product leaves its control (or is prescribed to plaintiff), but the proximate cause inquiry can quickly become an exercise in layered speculation. Cases acknowledging such a post-sale duty have typically involved situations where the seller had a continuing relationship with the purchaser, with an obvious route for relaying additional information about the product in a way that allows a jury to evaluate whether injury would have been avoided. In prescription drug and device cases, there tends not to be any direct relationship at any time and the manufacturer does not know the names or addresses of patients using its products. Over time, patients move, change their physicians, and even see physicians for reasons unrelated to the reason they were prescribed a drug or device in the past. Over time, manufacturers also stop selling specific products or product lines and may even go out of business. When it comes to drugs with alleged remote effects or devices that are implanted for many years, these real world considerations make potentially unlimited post-sale duties to warn a folly. We could go on, but we will not.Continue Reading Heeding Presumption Only Goes So Far In Post-Sale Warning Case