In most states, they are initially decided by a jury. Often, the jury expects them to be reduced on appeal, which they virtually always are. The idea of very large PDs is to “send a message” to other potential wrong-doers, and thus go beyond compensatory damages alone (which are to compensate the wronged parties).

The major problem with PDs is their inconsistency. This is not the fault of juries. There are very few guidelines about _how_ to come up with whatever amount - what principles should govern. The best read on this, in my view, is Prof. Cass Sunstein at U-Chicago. He has written or edited a number of volumes specifically on punitive damages, including one which is called that, published by Cambridge U Press as I recall.

Most PDs end up being quite small after appeals, etc. In the recent Exxon Valdez cases, for example, they were reduced to the point that each person whose living was destroyed by the oil spill (mainly fisherman) received the equivalent of about fifty dollars, twenty years later. That reflected by CDs and PDs.

They could perhaps buy a fish dinner with that.

Drug monographs include a mind-numbing amount of detail which most consumers don’t bother to read. I don’t know whether larger black box warnings would do any good as most don’t read those either. Rashes are an indication of a problem with almost all drugs. Educated parents (hers are both engineers) should know this without its having to be written in crayon letters two feet tall.

This sounds as though the parents overlooked their daughter’s rash and didn’t connect it with her medication or contact the doctor about it.

Drug monographs include a mind-numbing amount of detail which most consumers don’t bother to read. I don’t know whether larger black box warnings would do any good as most don’t read those either.

This sounds as though the parents overlooked their daughter’s rash and didn’t connect it with her medication or contact the doctor about it.

Thanks for the note…my new “retierment job” in academia and my need to try and enjoy the time outside of the Ivy Tower with my family sometimes preclude me from reading all Pharmalot stories. I am glad to see that more than one side gets protrayed in this publication. I wish this were the case with all outlets.

I am a big fan of Pharmalot because you are building it the way you are

Actually, I have run such items about trial lawyers as recently as earlier this month in connection with fen-phen litigation.

http://www.pharmalot.com/2008/06/destroying-documents-fen-phen-lawyers-on-trial/

This was the second such item I’ve run about this episode in the last couple of months.

Cheers
ed

I am sorry if I have inadvertently engaged in inappropriate generalizations. Yet, there are some disreputable individuals and organzations on all fronts. My point was not to impune all trial lawyers but to suggest that I would love to see some reporting in the context of product litigation on poor legal practices as well as poor pharma practices. When a sensationalistic story, such as the J&J one, first hits there is a lot of buzz but when that same story pans out to lack merit it gets little coverage. Also, unfortunately, the rhetorical presumption is bad pharma not bad legal action.

Just looking for a little bit of fair balance.

Lana writes: “J&J suppressed information to the FDA despite long time knowledge of these severe complications of SJS…back to the 1980’s. No label warnings added until independent studies from France of over 150 children had been harmed by Motrin in the same way.”

If this is true in the significant and relevant ways - that information was willfully suppressed from FDA, that the numbers are such that they can be linked to the drug (as an eventual label change suggests), then it sounds to me like there is, indeed, reason for this trial to go forward.

To assume from the start that it is Greedy Trial Lawyer Extortion, as some posts suggest, is - to me - the same kind of knee-demonizing as those who are “anti-pharma” whatever pharma does.