Wyeth Out of Luck with Nevada Jury

A Nevada jury has handed down stiff penalties to the the pharmaceutical company Wyeth in what could be the start of a large-scale redress for the company’s hormone replacement drugs:

All the lawsuits involve the drugs Premarin, an estrogen replacement, and Prempro, a combination of estrogen and progestin. The drugs are prescribed to women to ease symptoms of menopause.

This decision should be welcome to the women and their families who were put at risk by these drugs. As it now stands Wyeth will have to pay large damages to the plaintiffs in the case:

“These are very large numbers for compensatory damages,” said Howard Erichson, a law professor at Seton Hall University. “It has to be troubling for Wyeth because dollar figures like these suggest the jury entirely accepted the plaintiff’s version of the story…