Media Center

The Recorder, "Blood Feud"

          Two decades after hemophiliacs first accused four drug makers of intentionally selling them HIV-contaminated blood products, lawyers from Lieff Cabraser Heimann & Bernstein are seeking class status for at least 2,000 U.S. and foreign plaintiffs who say they suffered similar damages.
          The complaint alleges that Baxter Healthcare Corp., Bayer, Armour Pharmaceutical Co. and Alpha Therapeutic Corp. sold contaminated blood serum overseas for nearly two years after it withdrew the product -- under FDA pressure -- from the U.S. market. Additionally, Lieff Cabraser lawyers say the companies knowingly infected Americans with hepatitis C.
          "It's a story about companies knowing they had a blood product that was tainted. … The result was that 80 percent of the people who took this product died," said partner Robert Lieff, the lead attorney in the case.
          The drugs in question, known as Factor VIII and Factor IX, were considered miraculous when first released in 1980. They could stop profuse bleeding almost immediately, and quickly became a widely used therapy. But the products were made from donated blood serum, and until 1983, donors were not screened for HIV.
          The initial wave of lawsuits had mixed results for plaintiffs who had trouble proving that the companies were negligent. Some lost at trial, while most -- a total of 6,000 -- agreed to a 1997 settlement that awarded each family $100,000.
          In 2000, Lieff Cabraser partner Donald Arbitblit represented nine victims who opted out of a 1997 group settlement. They reached a confidential settlement with the companies. That led to a windfall for Lieff Cabraser.
          "Through that work, we became connected to what was a pretty connected network of worldwide hemophilia organizations," said Arbitblit.
        Seven partners are working on the case, with Robert Nelson, Heather Foster, Morris Ratner, Fabrice Vincent and Elizabeth Cabraser joining Lieff.
          According to Lieff's class certification motion, international sales documents obtained in discovery from the previous suits show the drug companies marketing contaminated serum overseas when clean stocks were available. The documents also claim that the companies sold hepatitis C-tainted product in the U.S. for at least two years after contamination was found.

The Christchurch Press (New Zealand), "Global Bad Blood Scandal"

          Three New Zealanders so far have joined thousands of haemophiliacs worldwide in a class action against four US pharmaceutical giants (and subsidiaries), claiming they were exposed to HIV and hepatitis C. The law suit, filed by Lieff Cabraser Heimann & Bernstein in the San Francisco Federal court, claims that products from the US companies resulted in mass infection and deaths of thousands of haemophiliacs.
          The accused companies are Bayer Corporation and its Cutter Biological division, Baxter Healthcare Corporation and its Hyland division, Armour Pharmaceutical Company and Alpha Therapeutic Corporation. The lawsuit claims that three companies recruited donors from high-risk populations, including prisoners and intravenous drug users, to obtain plasma for the production of clotting agents.
          The law suit claims that the US products, sold worldwide in the late 1970s and 1980s as beneficial "medicines", were, in fact, contaminated with the HIV virus and/or hepatitis C. It alleges that the companies stopped selling the products in the US because of the known risk of HIV and hepatitis C transmission. But it claims the companies continued distributing the old, non- heat-treated medicine in Europe, Latin America and Asia, after introducing a safer product in the US.
          The status of US blood products exported to New Zealand at the time is also under investigation by Lieff Cabraser. Lieff Cabraser primary attorney Lexi Hazam confirmed three New Zealanders are among the 1500 plaintiffs from more than 10 countries, including Italy, Germany, Argentina, Brazil, Hong Kong, Israel and the United Kingdom.
          "This is a worldwide tragedy affecting thousands of people," she said. Her firm is waiting to receive company records under discovery, which will enable plaintiffs' medical records to be matched against contaminated batches of blood.

The Sunday Times (London), "Blood Risk for Haemophiliacs 'Covered Up'"

          The danger of using infected blood products on haemophiliacs was known to government officials more than 20 years ago, newly uncovered documents reveal. Papers seen by the Sunday Times show doctors had linked cases of hepatitis C to specific brands of blood-clotting agents during a monitoring project in the 1970s.
          Thousands of haemophiliacs in Britain contracted hepatitis C from contaminated blood-clotting products used in their treatment in the 1970s and 1980s. The condition attacks the liver and can cause cirrhosis, liver failure and cancer.
          Carol Grayson, co-ordinator of Haemophilia Action UK, who uncovered the documents, said: "We were told nothing. They knew there was another type of hepatitis that was attacking the liver whether there was a test or not." Haemophiliac Andy Gunn, who is pursuing legal action in America against plasma manufacturers over alleged contamination, said he would ensure his lawyers were aware of the documents.

The Daily Journal, "Hemophiliacs Sue U.S. Blood Companies"

          Four U.S. companies exposed thousands of hemophiliacs to HIV and hepatitis C in the 1980s by selling them blood-clotting medicine made from high-risk donors, even after the transmission risk was known, a lawsuit alleges.
          The class action, filed in San Francisco federal court June 2, claims the drug firms focused on the bottom line, collecting blood from urban homosexuals, prisoners and intravenous drug users. The suit also accuses the companies of selling their surplus stock to hemophiliacs in Europe, Latin America and Asia in 1984 and 1985 after introducing a safer product in the United States.
          "It's a worldwide tragedy," says the class's lead attorney, Robert J. Nelson of Lieff Cabraser Heimann & Bernstein, LLP in San Francisco. "Thousands of people were made very, very sick, many of whom have died, as a direct result of the conduct of these American companies."

The Japan Times, "Japanese hemophiliacs invited to join U.S. suit over tainted-blood sales"

          A class action lawsuit was filed in a San Francisco federal court Monday on behalf of 15 European hemophiliacs suing seven firms, including a subsidiary of Mitsubishi Pharm Corp., for selling contaminated blood products that exposed them to HIV and hepatitis C, their lawyer said Tuesday.
          Attorney Robert Nelson said thousands of Japanese could also be named as potential plaintiffs because they contracted hepatitis C from unheated blood-clotting agents for hemophiliacs sold by Mitsubishi Pharm subsidiary Alpha Therapeutic Corp. as well as Bayer Corp., Baxter Healthcare Corp. and its subsidiary.
          "This is a worldwide tragedy," Nelson said. "Thousands of hemophiliacs have unnecessarily died from AIDS and many thousands more are infected with HIV or hepatitis C."

The Guardian (UK), "Law Suit for Infected Blood"

          An American firm has launched a lawsuit on behalf of haemophiliacs and survivors of haemophiliacs who were supposedly infected by contaminated blood products. The plaintiffs were allegedly infected with HIV or Hepatitis C after being given the product in the early to mid-80s.
          "Tens of thousands of haemophiliacs globally were infected with HIV or HCV after receiving blood products from blood plasma that was originally manufactured in the US," said attorney Robert Nelson of the San Francisco-based firm Lieff Cabraser, which is bringing the action on behalf of clients.
          At present, 15 people from the United Kingdom, Italy and Germany are named in the action.

The San Francisco Chronicle, "Bad blood between hemophiliacs, Bayer Patients sue over tainted transfusions spreading HIV, hep C"

          A San Francisco attorney filed a class-action lawsuit Monday on behalf of thousands of hemophiliacs who claim that Bayer Corp. and several other companies knowingly sold blood products contaminated with HIV and hepatitis C.
          The lawsuit, filed in federal court in San Francisco, alleges that the companies conspired to sell blood-clotting products that were manufactured using blood from sick, high-risk donors.
          The suit also alleges that companies stopped selling the products in the United States because of the known risk of HIV and hepatitis transmission but continued distributing the infected products in Latin America, Asia and Europe in 1984 and 1985.

The Los Angeles Times, "Lawsuit Alleges Companies Sold Bad Blood"

          Thousands of hemophiliacs filed a class-action lawsuit against Bayer Corp. and other companies, claiming they exposed patients to HIV and hepatitis C by selling products made with blood from sick, high-risk donors.
          The lawsuits, filed in federal court, allege the companies continued distributing the blood-clotting products in Asia and Latin America in 1984 and 1985, even after they stopped selling them in the United States because of the known risk of HIV and hepatitis transmission.
          In Germany, Bayer declined to comment on the suit, saying it had not yet received the relevant documents. Baxter Healthcare Corp., also named in the lawsuit, did not immediately return calls seeking comment.

The Boston Globe, Editorial, "Bayer's Bad Medicine"

          In the first years of the AIDS epidemic, many victims of the disease were hemophiliacs who used a clotting medicine made by mixing blood plasma from many donors. After the makers discovered that their product was transmitting a lethal infection, they started heating it to destroy the virus. But at least one company, a division of Bayer named Cutter Biological, continued to sell its nonheated medicine in Asia and Latin America after switching to the heated version for customers in North America and Europe. The callousness of the firm's decision making on what to do with "excess nonheated inventory" comes through in company memoranda reported on in the New York Times. After the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention wraned in March 1983 that blood products were apparently transmitting AIDS to hemophiliacs, Cutter in February 1984 got US approval for a heated version of its medicine. But it continued making the nonheated medicine until August of that year and continued to ship it until July 1985.
          Bayer told the Times that Cutter continued to make the unsafe product after starting to produce the safer version because some customers preferred the original medicine, fearing (wrongly) that the heating process would hurt its quality. Also, it said, some countries delayed approving the new version, and there was a shortage of plasma.
          But the Times said Cutter's records indicate it was trying to profit on "several large fixed-price contracts." At one point, when Asian hemophiliacs started asking for the safer medicine, Cutter told its Hong Kong distributor that almost all heated supplies were going to the United States and Europe, but a small amount would be available for Hong Kong's "most vocal patients."

South China Morning Post, "US Firm Sold Off Tainted Medicine in HK - HIV-Contaminated Blood Was Used Here While A Safer Version Was Sold Overseas"

          Hong Kong hemophiliacs were forced to rely in the mid-1980s on HIV-contaminated blood-clotting medicine sold across the region by a US company -- even while it marketed its newer, safer version of the drug in America and Europe.
          A South China Morning Post investigation has found the firm, Cutter, continued selling its Koate brand of blood coagulant concentrate in Hong Kong for 18 months after it started distributing a heat-treated version free of HIV in the US. At various times, the older and cheaper product was also sold in Taiwan, Singapore, Malaysia, Indonesia and Japan.
          The Post's investigation, conducted together with the New York Times, discovered how Cutter -- owned by German pharmaceutical giant Bayer -- told its Hong Kong distributor that the non heat-treated concentrate had "no severe hazard" even months after the US medical authorities confirmed that heat treatment could kill the HIV virus in blood products. One telex from Cutter to its Hong Kong distributor insisted that they "use up stocks" of the older drug while other documents show it had continued exporting the products for two months after the US Food and Drug Administration had said that it was "absolutely unacceptible." The government later confirmed that 61 of Hong Kong's more than 200 hemophiliacs had been infected with HIV, the virus that causes AIDS.

The New York Times, "Two Paths of Bayer Drug in 80's: Riskier Type Went Overseas"

          A division of the pharmaceutical company Bayer sold millions of dollars of blood-clotting medicine for hemophiliacs -- medicine that carried a high risk of transmitting AIDS -- to Asia and Latin America in the mid-1980s while selling a new, safer product in the West, according to documents obtained by the New York Times.
          The Bayer unit, Cutter Biological, introduced its safer medicine in late February 1984 as evidence mounted that the earlier version was infecting hemophiliacs with HIV. Yet for over a year, the company continued to sell the old medicine overseas, prompting a United States regulator to accuse Cutter of breaking its promise to stop selling the product.
          By continuing to sell the old version of the life-saving medicine, the records show, Cutter officials were trying to avoid being stuck with large stores of a product that was proving increasingly unmarketable in the United States and Europe. Yet even after it began selling the new product, the company kept making the old medicine for several months more. A telex from Cutter to a distributor suggests one reason behind that decision, too: the company had several fixed-price contracts and believed that the old product would be cheaper to produce.