Carrie Caliman George is a resident of Texas who filed a wrongful death lawsuit against Bayer after her daughter died of a pulmonary embolism on December 15, 2011. The lawsuit was filed on May 8, 2012, in the U.S. District Court, Southern District of Illinois.
The complaint states that George’s daughter, Cheri Malvern, began taking Yaz in August 2005 before switching to the generic version of the drug, Ocella, in March 2009. It was in 2010 that she was diagnosed with a pulmonary embolism. By 2011, Cheri was dead. George is now suing Bayer, the makers of both Yaz and Ocella, for failure to warn the public and healthcare professionals about the dangers linked to the pills, which include deep vein thrombosis and pulmonary embolism.
Research has repeatedly shown that Yaz, Yasmin and other drospirenone-based pills cause serious side effects which include heart attacks, strokes, gallbladder disease and blood clots that can lead to pulmonary embolisms and deep vein thrombosis. The pills’ main ingredient consists of the synthetic progestin drospirenone, which is said to be the cause of these harmful side effects. That fact has caused thousands of former Yaz patients to file lawsuits against Bayer.
While Bayer has steadfastly denied that drospirenone is any more dangerous than older birth control pills that do not contain drospirenone, the company recently agreed to a financial settlement with at least 500 plaintiffs to the tune of $110 million, which amounts to $220,000 per plaintiff. If this agreement is any indicator, Bayer may finally be ready to admit to wrongdoing soon. With luck, the FDA will recant its previous decision to leave the drug on the market. Many are hoping that the FDA will recall Yaz and other drospirenone-based pills in the wake of all of these injuries and deaths, especially considering Bayer’s settlement agreements don’t amount to much for the individual plaintiffs.
