Some women are finally getting some sort of closure. A new settlement being made between themselves and Germany’s largest drug maker, Bayer. According to reports Bayer will pay at least $110 million to settle about 500 lawsuits over claims that its Yasmin line of birth-control pills causes blood clots.
Officials of Bayer agreed to pay an average of about $220,000 a case to resolve the claims that its Yasmin and Yaz contraceptives caused sometimes fatal clots that can lead to heart attacks and strokes, said the source.
The settlements came after a federal judge in Illinois postponed a Jan. 9 trial of a suit accusing Bayer and some of its units of misleading women about the health risks of its birth-control pills so a mediator could try to negotiate a settlement.
Bayer had said in February that 170 Yasmin/Yaz cases in the U.S. had been settled out of court.
The settlements are also coming just as the U.S. Food and Drug Administration on April 10 ordered Bayer and other contraceptive makers to strengthen the blood-clot warnings on their products.
Pills like Bayer’s Yasmin, which contain a synthetic hormone called drospirenone, will have warning labels saying researchers have found they may triple the risk for clots.