Abbvie pays out over $3m after its testosterone replacement drug leads to heart attack

Abbvie has been ordered to pay over $3 million in damages to a man who asserts that the uise of the company’s testosterone replacement drug AndroGel drove him to a heart attack, a risk which he argues was vastly misrepresented.

Jesse Mitchell of Oregon had been using the therapy for five years before suffering the attack in 2012. While the jury concluded that Abbvie had not intentionally misrepresented the product in its marketing, it judged that the company had acted negligently, with the court awarding Mitchell £200,000 in compensatory damages and $3 million in punitive damages. Abbvie has said that it plans to appeal the decision.

Earlier, the Chicago-based firm was forced to pay out $140 million to a Tennessee resident who also claimed that the use of AndroGel led to a heart attack. Abbvie has requested that the verdict be thrown out, citing inconsistencies throughout the trial.

Over 6,000 similar cases are currently filed against a range of drugmakers including Eli Lilly, Endo International and GlaxoSmithKline over the use of testosterone replacement products, though more than 4,000 of these are levied against Abbvie. In the past months, GSK and Lilly have reportedly agreed to settle hundreds of these lawsuits, thought the details of these settlements are unknown.  

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