Onglyza Defendant Requests A Phased Pretrial Schedule

Onglyza Defendant Requests A Phased Pretrial Schedule

Introduction

In a response filed in the Eastern District of Kentucky, Onglyza drugmaker AstraZeneca asked Judge Karen Caldwell, presiding over all Onglyza heart failure lawsuits to follow a phased pretrial schedule by giving priority to the "general causation" issue of whether the diabetes medication causes heart failure before proceeding with the case-specific discovery. The drugmaker claimed that the court must refrain from providing the plaintiffs with “unfettered discovery” until the court decides whether they can support the evidence presented to prove Onglyza ’s heart failure risks.

The order indicated to bifurcate the case proceedings and stated, “the Court should prioritize general causation because it is pivotal to every case in this proceeding and because Plaintiffs’ allegations on their face fail to support many of their causation claims." However, plaintiffs pointed out that such a move would delay the litigation and might result in duplicative discovery. Discovery into all other issues and the defendant's proposal would be on hold till May 2020. A quarterly status conference to discuss the status of Onglyza litigation has been scheduled for December 18, 2018. The multidistrict litigation (MDL Docket No. 2809) over Onglyza side-effects is overlooked by Judge Karen K. Caldwell in the U.S. District Court for the Eastern District of Kentucky, for coordinated pretrial proceedings.