Watchers of the U.S. Supreme Court seem to agree that the high court will likely rule in favor of a drug manufacturer in a case that saw a Vermont woman loose her arm to gangrene.

However, consumer advocates appeared relieved that the case will affect only situations where there were no allegations that drug companies tried to hide information about potential risks and where the FDA rejected stronger label warnings.

The case, Wyeth v. Levine, has been billed as a major milestone in an effort by the pharmaceutical and other industries to free themselves of unpredictable state court personal injury litigation by embracing instead a single federal regulatory regime — in short, federal pre-emption of state courts.

In 2000, Vermont guitarist Diana Levine went to a clinic seeking relief for her migraine. She was injected with the Wyeth drug Phenergan by means of an intravenous method that was discouraged but not forbidden by the labeling, which had been approved by the Food and Drug Administration.

But based on arguments before the high court Monday, the case could be decided narrowly, giving little guidance about broader pre-emption issues beyond the area of drug labeling.

This entry was posted on Tuesday, November 4th, 2008 at 5:34 pm and is filed under Defective Drugs, Pain Reflief. You can follow any responses to this entry through the RSS 2.0 feed. You can leave a response, or trackback from your own site.