There are many medications on the market. Some help humanity a great deal. For instance, someone with diabetes might take insulin to ensure they don’t need emergency medical intervention.
You should know that at any time, drug companies continue working behind the scenes to come out with new drugs. They might spend years working on a drug and then try to get the FDA to sign off on it. That drug might go from clinical trials to store shelves and pharmacies after a multi-year process.
Sometimes, the FDA might feel a drug doesn’t pose any threat, but then, after people have used it for years, it makes them sick. Then, those people might file lawsuits against the manufacturer.
That’s what’s happening with Valsartan, and we’ll talk about that right now. We’ll also discuss what these ongoing lawsuits teach us.
What is Valsartan?
Valsartan is an antihypertension drug. In other words, people take it to treat heart failure and high blood pressure. If you have a heart attack, you might also take this drug because it lowers your death risk.
At one point, the manufacturers said there were low side effect risks with Valsartan. They listed dizziness, headaches, and liver damage in rare instances. The manufacturer also warned pregnant women not to take it.
Later, though, thousands of people developed cancer after using Valsartan. You can file suit if you took Valsartan and now you have cancer. The consumers suing the company allege that certain batches got out and that they’re defective and even harmful.
You Can Hire a Product Liability Lawyer
If you decide you want to sue after you developed cancer because you took Valsartan, you can hire a product liability attorney. Some lawyers do only these specific kinds of cases. You’ll want to find one who has won many similar lawsuits in the past.
When you meet with your lawyer or law firm, describe how often you took Valsartan, and for how long. Then, ask them if they think you have a case. If they do, they will probably take you on as a client.
Since thousands of these suits have appeared lately, you should have no issue finding a lawyer who can help you. They might suggest you sue the drug manufacturer, but they may also tell you that you can sue retailers or drug stores that carried the defective, harmful drugs. Many people have sued the Valsartan makers, but also the distributors and other medical entities.
Why Did This Drug Fail?
It appears that not all Valsartan gives you cancer. Instead, you have a much higher chance to develop it if you took Valsartan which contains something called NDMA. It is a probable human carcinogen, and the drug batches that contain it have a strong cancer link, according to doctors and scientists.
The FDA says that you should contact a doctor if you’ve taken Valsartan and you suspect it contains NDMA. You can contract various cancer varieties from exposure, including liver, kidney, colon, prostate, and others.
What Do These Lawsuits Teach Us?
These lawsuits teach us a couple of things. The first is that while a medication manufacturer wants to help you, they’re also making huge drug batches every day. Contamination can happen, and if it does, you might deal with dire consequences, especially if you take this drug every day for years on end and don’t know that it can harm you.
If you follow the Valsartan lawsuits that people have already filed all around the country, you’ll also quickly see that the drug manufacturer and anyone else named in the suits will usually settle once their lawyers establish a precedent. If they know a jury will hold them liable at trial, they’ll probably give you money to resolve the matter rather than dragging each case through the court system.
Drug manufacturers, and the networks that distribute them, make a ton of money. Countless billions pour in through drug manufacturing and sales.
If a drug proves faulty, like some Valsartan batches, and causes cancer or some other issue, the drug manufacturers and distributors might have to pay to settle lawsuits, but it’s just a drop in the bucket when you consider their total profits every quarter or year.
As a consumer, you have little choice but to trust a drug manufacturer when they say a drug’s okay based on their clinical trials. However, you never know when a medication might prove dangerous or deadly after you’ve taken it for years.