Health

  • March 19, 2024

    J&J Says Former Exec Stole Thousands Of Files In Move To Pfizer

    Johnson & Johnson has sued a former competitive strategy director in New Jersey federal court, claiming he illegally downloaded thousands of confidential files on his way out the door to work for direct competitor Pfizer.

  • March 19, 2024

    Fla. Judge Inclined To Grant CNN's Costs In Defamation Suit

    A Florida judge said Tuesday he might trim parts of CNN's $320,000 request for attorney fees and costs incurred defending a defamation suit brought by a West Palm Beach pediatric heart surgeon but declined the doctor's request for a wholesale reduction. 

  • March 19, 2024

    NC Med Mal Appeal Remains Dismissed Over Timeliness

    A North Carolina appeals panel on Tuesday declined to revive a family's medical malpractice wrongful death suit against a doctor and physician group, saying even if the court sets aside the rules violations that doomed the appeal before, it must still be dismissed for being filed too late.

  • March 19, 2024

    OptumRx Can't Get Motley Rice Disqualified From Opioid MDL

    An Ohio federal judge has denied a bid by pharmacy benefit manager OptumRx to disqualify Motley Rice LLC from representing plaintiffs in the national opioid litigation, saying the company hasn't shown that the firm's prior representation of states investigating opioids puts the company at a disadvantage in the multidistrict litigation.

  • March 19, 2024

    IFF Selling Pharma Unit To French Co. Roquette In $2.85B Deal

    IFF, a maker of ingredients and additives for food, health and home-based products, said Tuesday it has agreed to sell its Pharma Solutions business to French plant-based ingredient maker Roquette at an enterprise value of up to $2.85 billion. 

  • March 18, 2024

    Patent Suit Over AstraZeneca's Tagrisso Heads To Jury

    A Delaware federal judge said Monday that there are too many "genuine factual disputes" to end a lawsuit from a Pfizer brand claiming it developed a cancer treatment that's being infringed by a drug that has racked up billions in sales for rival AstraZeneca.

  • March 18, 2024

    Gasket Maker That Sued Asbestos Lawyers Faces SC Trial

    A major gasket maker that has previously sued asbestos lawyers for unfairly targeting it went to trial in South Carolina on Monday against claims by a mesothelioma patient's widow that the company skipped necessary safety testing.

  • March 18, 2024

    Texas Hospital Loses Bid To Dismiss Patients' Hack Suit

    A Texas federal judge handed a win to the plaintiffs suing a hospital system in the aftermath of a hack that saw hundreds of patients' data pilfered, dismissing some of the claims in the proposed class action but allowing the suit to move forward after a hearing Monday.

  • March 18, 2024

    Tribal Health Groups Say IHS Owes $4M In Support Funding

    Two tribal health groups serving parts of Alaska are suing the U.S. Department of Health and Human Services for failing to pay nearly $4 million in contract support costs for their delivery of services paid for with third-party revenue they collected, the subject of a matter now pending before the U.S. Supreme Court.

  • March 18, 2024

    Fla. Doc's Patient Info Subpoena Seeks Too Much, Court Says

    A Florida state trial judge shouldn't have approved subpoenas seeking a decade's worth of medical records from a patient who filed a malpractice suit against a doctor and hospital system, an appeals court has ruled, saying the defendants were allowed to cast "too wide a net."

  • March 18, 2024

    2nd Circ. Rejects 'New Standard' Of Patent Monopolies

    A Second Circuit panel on Monday revived antitrust allegations accusing Novartis of concealing the true history of an eye syringe treatment's development from the U.S. Patent and Trademark Office to edge Regeneron out of the market, faulting a district court for holding that antitrust markets can't be "coextensive" with the patent.

  • March 18, 2024

    The Biggest Trade Secrets Awards In The Last 5 Years

    Trade secrets cases are having a moment in the spotlight, thanks to some gargantuan damages awards over the past five years and more flexibility for plaintiffs to argue for what they think they are owed.

  • March 18, 2024

    Ga. Surgery Biz's False Claims Penalty Boosted To $5.4M

    A Georgia surgical center and its former head must now pay $5.4 million to end a kickback scheme tied to the indictment of the state's former insurance commissioner, an increase from a previous $3 million penalty that the federal government said the clinic and doctor had shirked.

  • March 18, 2024

    4th Circ. Sends Opioid 'Nuisance' Question To W.Va. Top Court

    The Fourth Circuit asked West Virginia's high court Monday to determine whether the state's public nuisance law can be used to target companies that shipped drugs to pharmacies in a community ravaged by addiction, a crucial question in litigation spawned by the opioid crisis.

  • March 18, 2024

    Biotech Ardelyx Beats Shareholder Suit Over Kidney Drug

    Biotechnology company Ardelyx Inc. has for now beaten a shareholder class action alleging the company and its top brass made false and misleading statements about regulatory approval of Ardelyx's drug for patients with chronic kidney disease.

  • March 18, 2024

    NY Gov. Audits Pot Regulator After Troubled Rollout

    New York Gov. Kathy Hochul on Monday announced an audit of the Empire State's embattled cannabis regulator to address the rocky implementation of the adult-use marijuana market, which has been plagued by delays, litigation and an explosion of unlicensed sellers.

  • March 18, 2024

    High Court Doubts Feds Coerced Social Media Cos.

    A majority of the U.S. Supreme Court appeared unconvinced Monday that the Biden administration violated the First Amendment by working with social media platforms to combat the spread of misinformation, often chiding Louisiana's solicitor general for presenting confusing and overly expansive arguments.

  • March 18, 2024

    Leerink Enticed Goldman Exec With False Promises, Suit Says

    An investment banker says she was lured away from a senior position at Goldman Sachs to Boston-based Leerink Partners with what turned out to be a meaningless job title and false promises of guaranteed bonuses, according to a lawsuit filed Monday in Massachusetts state court.

  • March 18, 2024

    Decline In EBSA Funding May Hurt Mental Health Parity Efforts

    The U.S. Department of Labor's employee benefits arm warned Congress in its latest budget request that it may have to scale back its efforts to implement federal mental health parity laws and the No Surprises Act by 2025.

  • March 18, 2024

    Hospital Network Let $1B Plan Pay Excessive Fees, Suit Says

    A Northern California hospital network cost workers millions of dollars by failing to leverage the "mammoth" size of its retirement plan to get a better deal on recordkeeping and administrative fees, according to a proposed class action.

  • March 18, 2024

    Doctor Can't Yank NBA Fraud Plea, Feds Insist

    Prosecutors have told a Manhattan federal judge that a doctor accused of assisting a group of NBA players in creating false documents to defraud the league's healthcare plan shouldn't be allowed to yank his guilty plea, arguing evidence shows his guilt and that too much time has passed.

  • March 18, 2024

    Doctors Keep Win In Suit Over Patient's Drowning Death

    A Georgia appeals court won't revive claims from the parents of a man who died by drowning after he was discharged from an Augusta hospital, saying the death is too far removed from his treatment and discharge, and the court can only speculate as to what led to the death.

  • March 18, 2024

    High Court Declines To Review Appeal Of EMT Liability Suit

    The U.S. Supreme Court on Monday declined to take up an appeal of a Tenth Circuit decision finding a group of EMTs had qualified immunity in a suit alleging their failure to secure the neck of a man who'd been injured in a bar fight caused his death.

  • March 16, 2024

    Up Next At High Court: Gov't Jawboning & Retaliatory Arrests

    The U.S. Supreme Court has a packed oral arguments calendar this week that includes disputes over the Biden administration's work with social media companies to combat misinformation, the appropriate evidence standard for bringing retaliatory arrest claims and whether the federal government can object to a consent decree entered into by three states.

  • March 15, 2024

    Judiciary Clarifies Judge Shopping Policy After Senator Letter

    The Judicial Conference of the United States said Friday that its updated policy aimed at preventing litigants from shopping for the judge of their choice is not intended to overstep judges' authority or discretion under the law, issuing guidance one day after Republican senators pushed back against the policy.

Expert Analysis

  • Vagueness In Calif. Climate Law Makes Compliance Tricky

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    California's recently enacted Voluntary Carbon Market Disclosures Act requires companies making claims of carbon neutrality, or significant greenhouse gas emissions reductions, to disclose information supporting those claims — but vague and conflicting language in the statute poses multiple problems for businesses, say John Rousakis and Chris Bowman at O'Melveny.

  • Grant Compliance Takeaways From Ga. Tech's FCA Settlement

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    Georgia Tech’s recent False Claims Act settlement over its failure to detect compliance shortcomings in a grant program was unique in that it involved a voluntary repayment of funds prior to the resolution, offering a few key lessons for universities receiving research funding from the government, says Jonathan Porter at Husch Blackwell.

  • Series

    Competing In Dressage Makes Me A Better Lawyer

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    My lifelong participation in the sport of dressage — often called ballet on horses — has proven that several skills developed through training and competition are transferable to legal work, especially the ability to harness focus, persistence and versatility when negotiating a deal, says Stephanie Coco at V&E.

  • Potential Defendant Strategies Amid Calif. Privacy Questions

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    Although the current case law surrounding the California Consumer Privacy Act is in its infancy, courts have begun addressing important issues related to the notice-and-cure provisions of the statute, and these decisions show defendant-businesses would be wise to assert their notice rights early and repeatedly, say Viola Trebicka and Dan Humphrey at Quinn Emanuel.

  • How Facilities Can Address Legal Risk Of Wandering Patients

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    Wandering behavior in acute care facilities is a challenging healthcare issue rife with legal ramifications, so it's crucial for facilities to perform the correct risk assessments and appropriate interventions, says legal nurse consultant Marilyn McCullum.

  • How Poor Governance, Weak Contracts Harm Cannabis Cos.

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    Decades into cannabis decriminalization and legalization, many companies in the industry still operate on a handshake basis or fail to keep even minimally required records, which can have devastating effects and lead to costly, business-killing litigation, says Griffen Thorne at Harris Bricken.

  • Del. Ruling Adds Momentum For Caremark Plaintiffs

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    The Delaware Supreme Court's recent opinion in Lebanon County Employees' Retirement Fund v. Collis could be viewed as expanding plaintiffs' ability to viably plead a Caremark claim against directors, so Delaware companies should be on heightened alert and focus on creating a record of board oversight, say attorneys at V&E.

  • How Biotech Cos. Can Utilize Synthetic Royalty Financing

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    Synthetic royalty transactions have been on the rise as a funding structure for biotechnology companies, but questions have arisen surrounding how such transactions work, and structuring them correctly requires a nuanced understanding, say Todd Trattner and Ryan Murr at Gibson Dunn.

  • 2 SEC Orders Illuminate Bribery Risks For US-China Cos.

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    The U.S. Securities and Exchange Commission’s foreign bribery-related resolutions with 3M and Clear Channel offer important takeaways on compliance risks for companies with operations in China, from the role of traditionally low-risk vendors to gaps in internal accounting controls, say attorneys at Miller & Chevalier.

  • The Legal Industry Needs A Cybersecurity Paradigm Shift

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    As law firms face ever-increasing risks of cyberattacks and ransomware incidents, the legal industry must implement robust cybersecurity measures and privacy-centric practices to preserve attorney-client privilege, safeguard client trust and uphold the profession’s integrity, says Ryan Paterson at Unplugged.

  • Best Practices For Untangling Mass Tort Claimants' Liens

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    Recent litigation over faulty earplugs produced by 3M is just one example of a mass tort where settlement payouts to claimants will likely be complicated by the number of liens and lienholders involved — but claimants' attorneys can speed up the lien resolution process by keeping a few key strategies in mind, says Mark Eveland at Verus.

  • 5 Reasons Associates Shouldn't Take A Job Just For Money

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    As a number of BigLaw firms increase salary scales for early-career attorneys, law students and lateral associates considering new job offers should weigh several key factors that may matter more than financial compensation, say Albert Tawil at Lateral Hub and Ruvin Levavi at Power Forward.

  • How Biotech Deals May Help Competition, Despite FTC View

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    The Federal Trade Commission's complaint against Sanofi's proposed partnership with Maze Therapeutics highlights increasing skepticism of so-called killer acquisitions, but a closer look reveals potentially legitimate reasons behind why entities might decide to delay or abandon the development of acquired products, say consultants at Analysis Group.

  • Health Policy Legislative Landscape May Remain Frozen

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    With Congress again delaying the full resolution of fiscal year 2024 federal spending legislation, there is now an additional window in which Congress could work through several priority issues for healthcare stakeholders, though these issues are unlikely to be resolved in time, say attorneys at Faegre Drinker.

  • Expediting Psychedelics Approvals In The US And Canada

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    Accelerated regulatory pathways for psychedelics in the U.S. and Canada play a pivotal role in the progression of drugs, devices and novel therapies toward commercialization, say Kimberly Chew at Husch Blackwell, and Ana Dukic and Sabrina Ramkellawan at AxialBridge.

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