The sales of Yaz may be in a slump right now due to all of the lawsuits against Bayer over claims of the increased risk of severe side effects — but the profits are still rising, according to current reports.
At the end of April, Bayer raised its overall forecast because the company’s commodity prices got a big boost, and this increased the sales of the company’s crop-science products. During Bayer’s announcement, company representatives stated that profits rose as much as 8.4 percent ($1.01 billion) and that the company’s total sales managed to get as high as $14 billion.
All of Bayer’s success is astounding considering that the company has been losing sales to generic counterparts. They have also been battling against negative press thanks to the thousands of Yaz lawsuits amid claims that the company purposely hid the drug’s side effects and illegally marketed Yaz’s off-label uses.
In the first quarter of this year, Bayer’s pharmaceutical sales made as much as $3.9 billion, which was a 4.7 percent increase. In a letter the company wrote to the stockholders, it said American Yaz sales “declined significantly” in the first quarter. Yaz is the company’s second-best seller, surpassed only by the drug Betaseron which is used as a treatment for multiple sclerosis.
Even with generic competition, Bayer is likely losing sales because of the bad press and lawsuits. So far, more than 7,000 women have filed a Yaz lawsuit. So many of them, in fact, that the litigations have been consolidated in a multi-district litigation in Illinois. The cases will be heard by Judge David R. Herndon. Depositions currently are being taken and the cases are not expected to reach a courtroom until later on this year.