Essure, a permanent contraceptive implant manufactured by Bayer Corp and its entities, has been the subject of thousands of injury reported, warnings from the FDA, and regulatory restrictions. The medical device technology has gone so badly awry that Bayer recently announced that it will no longer sell Essure in the US.
Judge Rules Essure Cases Return to Philadelphia
As cases against Bayer over injuries sustained due to Essure make their way through the court system, a recent ruling by US District Judge of the Eastern District of Pennsylvania has important implications for anyone who has been harmed by the product. The ruling by Judge John P. Padova found that the federal court did not have jurisdiction over the cases against Bayer over Essure. Instead, he ruled that these cases should be resolved in the Philadelphia Court of Common Pleas, where they were originally filed. The cases were removed from Philadelphia by Bayer, when its legal team insisted that plantiffs’ claims involved and interpretation of federal regulations, thus making the case a matter of federal jurisdiction.
Cases Come Home to Philadelphia Court of Common Please
In spite of Bayer’s insistence, Federal Judge Padova felt that state and local law ought to be applied to the Essure litigation, and returned the cases that had made their way into federal court to their original place of filing, Philadelphia. While Bayer’s attorneys certainly had a legal point in trying to remove the cases to federal court, the move was at least an equal amount strategic, since Philadelphia is well-known to be a plaintiff-friendly venue. Indeed, plaintiffs attorneys and their clients ought to rejoice at Judge Padova’s decision, since it promises them a much more favorable hearing when they have their days in court.
Essure Leads to Tens of Thousands of Lawsuits and Gets Pulled by Manufacturer
Essure is a semi-permanent birth control technology that involves the implantation of metal coils that have a spider-like appearance in a patient’s fallopian tubes. Since its appearance on the medical device market in the early 2000s, Essure has lead to more than 16,000 lawsuits against Bayer and its subsidiaries. These lawsuits allege that the system lead to serious injuries and complications and that, worse, Bayer failed to warn patients who had the implants of the risks of breakage and malfunction.
Some of the most common types of complications due to Essure include:
Perforation of fallopian tubes
Perforation of the uterus
Perforation of the rectum
Perforation of the colon
Chronic pelvic pain
Chronic abdominal pain
Autoimmune disease
