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Notice:
Lieff Cabraser Heimann & Bernstein, LLP continues to prosecute blood factor litigation. However, we are not representing or accepting new clients with injuries due to contaminated blood factor. |
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Introduction:
Lawsuits by Persons with Haemophilia |
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| Lieff
Cabraser Heimann & Bernstein, LLP, represents persons with
haemophilia worldwide, or their survivors and estates, who received
blood products manufactured by American companies in the early
to mid-1980's. The blood products were known as factor concentrate,
Factor VIII ("antihemophilic factor" or "AHF")
and Factor IX, and were manufactured and sold in the U.S., and
exported worldwide. |
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plaintiffs allegedly became infected with the HIV
and/or Hepatitis C ("HCV") viruses from
exposure to virus-contaminated Factor VIII and IX.
Lieff Cabraser is representing haemophiliacs: |
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- from
outside the United States who were infected with HIV
and/or HCV, and
- from
within the United States who were infected with HCV,
but not also co-infected with HIV.
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1978, there were four major companies in the United States engaged
in the manufacture, production and sale of Factor VIII and IX:
Armour Pharmaceutical Company, Bayer Corporation and its Cutter
Biological division, Baxter Healthcare Corporation and its Hyland
Pharmaceutical division and Alpha Therapeutic Corporation, which
have been or are defendants in certain lawsuits. |
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plaintiffs allege that the companies manufactured and sold blood
factor products as beneficial "medicines" that were,
in fact, contaminated with HIV and/or HCV and resulted in the
mass infection and/or deaths of thousands of haemophiliacs worldwide. |
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is believed that three of these companies, Alpha, Baxter and
Cutter, recruited and paid donors from high risk populations,
including prisoners, intravenous drug users, and blood centers
with predominantly homosexual donors, to obtain blood plasma
used for the production of Factor VIII and IX. Plaintiffs allege
that these companies failed to exclude donors, as mandated by
federal law, with a history of viral hepatitis. Such testing
could have substantially reduced the likelihood of plasma containing
HIV and/or HCV entering plasma pools. |
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has been further alleged by plaintiffs in various cases that
that the defendants fraudulently misrepresented to government
officials and the public that Factor VIII and IX were safe to
use and that they had undertaken serious, timely and effective
efforts to reduce the risk to haemophiliacs of developing AIDS
and HCV. |
| Plaintiffs
charge that from July 1982, when the first evidence that haemophiliacs
had died from AIDS surfaced, through 1985, the defendants acted
in concert to avoid recalling Factor VIII and IX; to avoid warning
patients of the risks of HIV and HCV infection posed by their
products; to continue to market the products as safe; to avoid
implementing testing of Factor VIII and IX for the presence
of hepatitis, which would have served as a surrogate for testing
for HIV and HCV; to avoid developing and implementing simple
methods of viral inactivation that would have eliminated all
or most of the infections; and to issue public statements minimizing
the risk of contracting AIDS and HCV from their blood factor
products and overpromoting the benefits of those products. |
| Tens
of thousands of haemophiliacs worldwide were infected with HIV
and/or HCV during the early and mid-1980’s after receiving
Factor VIII and IX infusions from blood plasma that was originally
gathered, processed and manufactured in the United States by
Armour, Cutter, Baxter and Alpha or their subsidiaries. Many
of these persons have since died. Others were children or teenagers
when they received the products and have been infected with
AIDS and/or hepatitis B and/or C for most of their lives. |
| On
May 22, 2003, the New York Times reported that Cutter
Biological sold millions of dollars of blood-clotting medicine
for haemophiliacs - medicine that carried a high risk of transmitting
AIDS - to Asia and Latin America in the mid-1980's while selling
a new, safer product in the West. Cutter introduced its safer
medicine in late February 1984 as evidence mounted that the
earlier version was infecting haemophiliacs with HIV. Yet for
over a year, the New York Times reported that the company
continued to sell the old medicine, known as Blood Factor Concentrate,
overseas. |
| Lieff
Cabraser is working with co-counsel Charles Kozak and lawyers
from Argentina, Germany, Hong Kong, Ireland, Israel, Italy,
the Netherlands, Taiwan, the United Kingdom and many other countries
in Africa, Asia, Europe, Latin America and the Middle East to
bring claims in U.S. courts against the responsible American
companies that, in the early to mid-1980's, produced blood products
that were contaminated with HIV and/or HCV. |
| Lieff
Cabraser Heimann & Bernstein, LLP is a fifty-plus
attorney law firm with offices in San Francisco, New York and
Nashville. Since 1972, Lieff Cabraser has successfully represented
residents of the United States and persons living abroad in
a wide range of cases, including personal injury lawsuits.
For the last five years, the National
Law Journal has recognized Lieff Cabraser as one of the top plaintiffs' firms
in the nation. |
| Lieff
Cabraser enjoys a national reputation for professional integrity
and the successful prosecution of our clients' claims. In addition
to our fifty-plus attorneys, we are staffed with top-notch
paralegals, registered nurses, scientific analysts, investigators and litigation
support specialists. Considerable personnel resources, along
with our ability to advance the costs in our clients' cases,
enable Lieff Cabraser to litigate against the largest and most
powerful corporations in the world. To learn more about our
firm, click here. |
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Copyright © 2003-2007 Lieff Cabraser Heimann &
Bernstein, LLP |
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