[NEWS] Oklahoma judge to rule in $17 billion opioid lawsuit against J&J – Loganspace AI

(Reuters) – An Oklahoma expend on Monday will expend whether Johnson & Johnson desires to be held liable in a $17 billion lawsuit alleging the drugmaker’s marketing practices fueled the opioid epidemic by causing a flood of painkillers in the market.

The case by Oklahoma Authorized skilled Regular Authorized skilled Regular Mike Hunter became once the first to pass to trial out of hundreds of cases introduced by teach and native governments in opposition to opioid manufacturers and distributors.

Think Thad Balkman, of Cleveland County District Court docket in Norman, Oklahoma, is scheduled to yelp his resolution from the bench at 4 p.m. EDT.

The litigation is being closely watched by plaintiffs in about 2,000 opioid lawsuits pending sooner than a federal expend in Ohio who has been pushing for a settlement sooner than an October trial.

Opioids had been appealing in nearly 400,000 overdose deaths from 1999 to 2017, primarily based on the U.S. Facilities for Illness Alter and Prevention. Since 2000, some 6,000 Oklahomans like died from opioid overdoses, primarily based on the teach’s legal professionals.

Within the route of a seven-week bench trial, legal professionals for the teach of Oklahoma argued that J&J performed a years-long marketing campaign that minimized the addictive painkillers’ dangers and promoted their advantages.

The teach’s legal professionals called J&J an opioid “kingpin” and argued that its marketing efforts created a public nuisance as doctors over-prescribed the tablets, leading to a surge in overdose deaths in Oklahoma.

J&J has denied wrongdoing. The drugmaker in court has stated its marketing claims had scientific give a attach to and that its painkillers, Duragesic and Nucynta, made up a runt portion of opioids prescribed in Oklahoma.

Lawyers for Unusual Jersey-primarily based J&J argued in court papers that the teach’s case rests on a “radical” interpretation of the teach’s public nuisance law.

Hunter, the attorney customary, is in the hunt for to create J&J pay better than $17 billion to aid the teach take care of the epidemic for the next 30 years thru addiction medication and prevention programs.

The trial came after Oklahoma resolved claims in opposition to OxyContin maker Purdue Pharma LP in March for $270 million and in opposition to Teva Pharmaceutical Industries Ltd in May presumably perhaps merely for $85 million, leaving simplest J&J as a defendant.

Some plaintiffs’ legal professionals like when compared the opioid cases to litigation by states in opposition to the tobacco industry that led to a $246 billion settlement in 1998.