33 States to Get $62 Million in Zyprexa Case Settlement (Eli Lilly)

[depakid]

Source: NY Times

Eli Lilly has agreed to pay $62 million to 33 states to settle claims that it improperly marketed Zyprexa, its top-selling drug, to patients who did not have schizophrenia or bipolar disorder, its only approved uses.

The settlement, to be announced Tuesday, ends an 18-month investigation led by the offices of the attorneys general of Illinois and Oregon, which contended that Lilly had violated consumer protection laws by urging doctors to prescribe Zyprexa to patients who did not need it.

It is the largest settlement paid by a drug company in a state consumer protection case, topping the $58 million that Merck paid to settle similar allegations about Vioxx, lawyers for the states said.

The agreement may also be a sign that a much larger deal is near in a separate but related civil and criminal investigation led by federal prosecutors in Philadelphia. In that case, Lilly is expected to pay more than $1 billion in fines and restitution to states and the federal government and may also plead guilty to a misdemeanor criminal charge related to off-label marketing of Zyprexa.

Read more: http://www.nytimes.com/2008/10/07/business/07zyprexa.html?ref=business

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It'll be nice when the states no longer have to be the sole vanguard of accountability. Hold on, folks- that day is coming.

[libodem]

1. As a nurse

I watched many geriatric patients with dementia be prescribed psychotropic meds for behavior. Sometimes it did help because some mental diseases of aging do exibit psychotic features. But I've also seen them used experimentally with disastrous results. Warnings have recently come out that these drugs can decrease life expectancy, in the elderly.

[Tandalayo_Scheisskopf]

2. Well, they gave my mom atypicals for dementia...

When she was in the hospital for pneumonia and 7 broken vertebrae from osteoporosis, and it led directly to her death. Of course, this was before they knew that atypicals could do that, back in 2001. But she went into the ambulance chattering like a catbird and came out what I called "walking comatose". As I remember, they did have her on one of the atypicals. She died not long after that. Her body just shut down. Long oozing cracks in her arms.