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April 15, 2024
Feds Seek Prison For Group That Invaded Abortion Clinic
Prosecutors are seeking prison sentences for six anti-abortion activists convicted of storming a Washington, D.C., abortion clinic, including a six-year term for the alleged "criminal mastermind" behind this and other blockades.
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April 15, 2024
Pharmacy, Courier Co. Settle Driver's Classification Suit
A delivery driver and a CVS-owned pharmacy and a logistics and courier firm told an Illinois federal court that they have reached a settlement resolving claims that the company misclassified workers as independent contractors and paid them neither minimum nor overtime premium wages.
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April 15, 2024
Justices Won't Nix FDA Labeling Preemption For State Claims
The Supreme Court on Monday let stand lower court findings that the unique authority of the federal Food and Drug Administration preempted and, therefore, justified dismissing a proposed class action that alleged a Johnson & Johnson subsidiary broke Massachusetts law by misbranding Lactaid drug products as dietary supplements.
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April 15, 2024
High Court Turns Away Fired Male Doctor's Sex Bias Suit
The U.S. Supreme Court refused Monday to review a cardiologist's unsuccessful gender bias suit alleging he was fired after being falsely accused of mistreating female colleagues, despite his argument that the Second Circuit used the wrong legal standard when it backed the case's dismissal.
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April 15, 2024
Justices Won't Review ERISA Suit Over Heart Transplant
The U.S. Supreme Court has declined to review the Fourth Circuit's decision only partially reviving a suit brought by the mother of a deceased airline worker whose employer refused to cover his heart transplant surgery until after his death.
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April 12, 2024
'Much More Is Coming': Experts See Wave Of AI-Related Suits
Legal experts speaking Friday at the University of California, Berkeley School of Law's symposium on artificial intelligence and evidence in civil litigation warned that broadening usage and increased regulation will lead to a wave of litigation over the technology, leaving courts to analyze the "black box" of corporate AI algorithms to determine liability.
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April 12, 2024
NJ Court Revives Spinal Injury Suit After E-Filing Glitch
A New Jersey appeals court on Friday reinstated a medical malpractice suit accusing a physician of causing a woman's severe spinal injuries, saying an unexplained glitch in the trial court's electronic filing system wrongly led to a dismissal of the suit.
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April 12, 2024
Wash. Hospital Workers Say Class Suits Are Mirror Images
A group of healthcare workers urged a Washington state judge to find that their employer has violated the same wage laws that an affiliated hospital system was recently found liable for in a parallel case, contending at a Friday hearing that the two class actions ultimately target the same parent company.
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April 12, 2024
NY Health Network To Pay $1M For Deceptive COVID Test Bills
Long Island, New York-based hospital network Northwell Health will pay $1 million over allegations that it fraudulently billed patients for a hospital visit after they came for what they thought was a free COVID-19 test, the state's attorney general said Friday.
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April 12, 2024
Judge Rejects Tehum's $54M Bid To Resolve Injury Suits
A Texas bankruptcy judge has rejected prison healthcare company Tehum Care Services Inc.'s $54 million settlement to resolve hundreds of personal injury suits while declining the claimant committee's request to dismiss the Chapter 11 case.
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April 12, 2024
Mich. Hospital Must Face MedMal Suit Against Contract Doc
A hospital will have to face claims related to the alleged medical malpractice of its ICU director, a contractor, because the hospital did not make it clear to a patient who died that the doctor was not one of its employees, a Michigan appellate panel has said.
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April 12, 2024
DEA Unlawfully Pushing Psychedelics Ban, Researcher Says
A psychedelic research company has asked a Washington federal judge to block the Drug Enforcement Administration from proceeding with its plan to ban two psychedelic substances, saying the agency's process for bringing the matter before an administrative judge has been unlawful.
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April 12, 2024
Atrium Stakes Claim To Trust Of Prominent NC Textile Family
Atrium Health is looking to sack trustees currently standing in the way of the hospital system inheriting a substantial sum of money from one of North Carolina's most prominent families, saying the trustees have refused to pay its distributions and are hiding information.
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April 12, 2024
Split Mich. Panel Restores Overdose Suit Against Pain Doctor
Pandemic-prompted court orders that gave litigants in Michigan extra time to file lawsuits have continued to divide the state's appellate bench, as another three-judge panel couldn't agree Thursday on whether the orders gave a woman's estate extra time to sue her doctor.
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April 12, 2024
Mich. High Court Snapshot: Atty Sanctions Kick Off April
The Michigan Supreme Court returns Tuesday for its April session, hearing oral arguments about judges' ability to sanction lawyers for past attorneys' work in a case, what defendants say could be double recovery in wrongful death cases, and an attempt to use a Larry Nassar-inspired law to sue Catholic priests for decades-old abuse allegations.
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April 12, 2024
Trade Groups Urge Senators To Advance Patent Reform Bills
Groups representing inventors, startups and medical technology companies are putting pressure on U.S. senators to pass bills that would prospectively limit the ability of courts to throw out patent lawsuits, a month after tech industry groups argued the legislation would trigger an onslaught of patent litigation.
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April 12, 2024
Woman Pleads Guilty To $1.3M COVID Tax Credit Fraud
A California woman pled guilty to fraudulently obtaining $2 million in COVID-19 government loans and falsely claiming $1.3 million in tax credits, crimes that could result in a 20-year prison sentence, the U.S. Department of Justice said.
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April 12, 2024
Asbury Park Escapes Pot Co.'s Zoning Board Conspiracy Suit
A New Jersey federal court has dismissed a medical cannabis company's suit alleging Asbury Park and its zoning board conspired with a rival to block it from operating a treatment center, saying the complaint fails to support its allegations of the scheme.
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April 11, 2024
Sandoz Says Feds Misclassified Generics As 'Innovator Drugs'
Pharmaceutical company Sandoz Inc. sued the Centers for Medicare & Medicaid Services in Washington, D.C., federal court on Wednesday, alleging the agency ignored the company's objection to classifying two of its generics as "innovator drugs," which could impact Sandoz's rebate obligations under Medicaid.
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April 11, 2024
FTC Curtails Treatment Provider's Sharing Of Health Data
The Federal Trade Commission took its latest step Thursday to crack down on the mishandling of sensitive health information, announcing a settlement that requires a New York-based alcohol addiction treatment service to obtain affirmative consent before sharing this data with third parties and bars the company from disclosing this information for advertising purposes.
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April 11, 2024
UnitedHealth Patients' Addiction Coverage Suit Revived, Again
The Ninth Circuit on Thursday revived for the second time a proposed class action accusing UnitedHealth of wrongly rejecting coverage for outpatient substance use disorder treatments in violation of federal benefits law, finding the plaintiff plausibly alleged the insurer employed an excessively strict review process for those claims.
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April 11, 2024
Hospitals Responsible For Contract ER Docs, Justices Say
Washington state's high court ruled on Thursday that hospitals may be held liable for alleged neglectfulness of contracted doctors working in their emergency rooms, reviving negligence claims against the medical center brought by the estate of a woman killed by a flesh-eating disease that ER caregivers allegedly failed to diagnose.
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April 11, 2024
Full 8th Circ. Hears Ark. Bid To Revive Youth Trans Care Ban
An en banc panel of the Eighth Circuit weighing whether to revive an Arkansas state law that banned gender-affirming care for children and teens heard oral arguments Thursday, as Arkansas officials sought to demonstrate that the law does not unconstitutionally discriminate based on sex.
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April 11, 2024
Ernest Health Hit With Suit After Cybercriminal Data Breach
A group of former Ernest Health Inc. patients has hit the Texas-based hospital system with a proposed class action after a notorious group of cybercriminals breached the company's systems, saying that the company should've done more to protect patient data in a Thursday complaint.
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April 11, 2024
FDA Commissioner Says Congress Must Act On Hemp, CBD
The commissioner of the U.S. Food and Drug Administration said Thursday that the agency did not consider hemp-derived CBD safe enough to be sold lawfully as a dietary supplement, and urged Congress to create a new pathway to regulate the substance.
Expert Analysis
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5 Litigation Funding Trends To Note In 2024
Over the next year and beyond, litigation funding will continue to evolve in ways that affect attorneys and the larger litigation landscape, from the growth of a secondary market for funded claims, to rising interest rates restricting the availability of capital, says Jeffery Lula at GLS Capital.
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Disability Benefits Ruling Holds Claim Evaluation Lessons
In Haynes v. Principal Life Insurance, a Texas federal court recently overturned a disability benefits denial, providing both claimants and insurers with valuable insight on what constitutes a valid benefits claim, says Mark DeBofsky at DeBofsky Law.
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Lessons From DOJ's Handling Of Rare Medicare Fraud Case
The U.S. Department of Justice's recent indictment against HealthSun sheds light on the relatively rare circumstances in which the agency may pursue criminal charges for fraud involving Medicare Advantage, but its subsequent decision not to prosecute shows that compliance efforts can mitigate penalties, say attorneys at WilmerHale.
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Unpacking NIST's Guidance On Genomic Data Cybersecurity
The National Institute of Standards and Technology's final internal report on cybersecurity of genomic data highlights unique concerns associated with the use of such data and provides strong recommendations for risk management, though one area of the report may cause some confusion, say attorneys at Ropes & Gray.
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Key Legal Trends For Healthcare And Life Sciences In 2024
Due to the impact of contentious legal battles over drug pricing negotiations, the growing integration of artificial intelligence into drug development and manufacturing, and the publication of industry segment-specific guidance, the year ahead promises to be a dynamic period of changes and challenges, say Xin Tao and Lois Liu at Baker McKenzie.
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What To Know About FCA Cybersecurity Enforcement
Now is a good time for practitioners, government contractors and potential relators to review recent developments in cybersecurity-related False Claims Act enforcement, and consider best practices for navigating this space in the new year, say Ellen London at London & Stout, and Li Yu and Molly Knobler at DiCello Levitt.
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8 Privacy Law Predictions For 2024
As the new year begins, looking back to several of last year's privacy law developments may help companies forecast what to focus on when updating their privacy programs, including children's privacy, so-called dark patterns and the collection of data by connected cars, say attorneys at Sheppard Mullin.
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Series
ESG Around The World: South Africa
While South Africa has yet to mandate the reporting of nonfinancial and environmental, social, and corporate governance issues, policy documents and recent legislative developments are likely to have a material impact in the country's transition to a low-carbon economy and in meeting its international obligations, say Glynn Kent at Eversheds Sutherland.
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FOIA Exemption Questions On Redacted HHS Cannabis Letter
The U.S. Department of Health and Human Services' recent recommendation letter concerning the rescheduling of cannabis was heavily redacted, and based on an analysis on the applicability of Freedom of Information Act Exemption 5 to the letter, it's likely that we will see successful legal challenges to those redactions, say attorneys at Troutman Pepper.
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Evaluating Retroactivity Of Mich. Drugmaker Immunity Repeal
In assessing whether a new Michigan law lifting drugmakers' blanket immunity from product liability suits will apply retroactively, there are four key factors that Michigan courts will likely consider, say Sherry Knutson and Brenda Sweet at Tucker Ellis.
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4 Legal Ethics Considerations For The New Year
As attorneys and clients reset for a new year, now is a good time to take a step back and review some core ethical issues that attorneys should keep front of mind in 2024, including approaching generative artificial intelligence with caution and care, and avoiding pitfalls in outside counsel guidelines, say attorneys at HWG.
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Bribery Settlement Gives Insight On DOJ Policies
Chemical company Albemarle’s recent $218 million settlement with the government to resolve foreign bribery claims provides valuable data points for companies on the U.S. Department of Justice’s voluntary self-disclosure policy and its clawback pilot program, say Michael DeBernardis and Tiauna Mathieu at Hughes Hubbard.
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A Primer On New Calif. Health Transaction Reporting Rules
New California regulations regarding the reporting of certain transactions involving healthcare entities, which took effect on Jan. 1, address some industry feedback about overly broad requirements but still leave several areas of concern, says Andrew Demetriou at Husch Blackwell.
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Opinion
Waiving COVID-19 IP Protections Would Harm US Industry
President Joe Biden should turn down a World Trade Organization proposal to waive crucial intellectual property protections behind COVID-19 tests and diagnostics — protections that allow U.S. companies to sustain millions of jobs and develop life-saving treatments that benefit patients in every country, says former U.S. Circuit Judge Paul Michel, now at the Council for Innovation Promotion.
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Series
In The CFPB Playbook: Rulemaking Rush Before Election Year
In this quarterly Consumer Financial Protection Bureau activity recap by former bureau personnel, attorneys at McGuireWoods explain the regulator's recent push to finalize new rules about data aggregators, digital payment apps and more before the election-year Congressional Review Act window opens.