E-Ferol Class Action Lawsuit
A federal judge recently approved a $110 million class-action settlement against the maker and distributor of an intravenous vitamin E supplement, E-Ferol, that government officials have said may be related to the deaths of dozens of premature infants in the mid-1980s.
U.S. District Judge Sidney A. Fitzwater recently approved the settlement which was filed in Wichita Falls in North Texas.
A Fort Worth Texas lawyer, Art Brender represented 369 plaintiffs and said that the supplement was on the market for four and half months before it was recalled in April 1984. Health officials have since linked E-Ferol to the deaths of up to 40 infants. Originally marketed as a way to prevent or reduce blindness in premature infants E-Ferol was sold without FDA approval.
Research has since determined the chemical agent which made the vitamin E water soluble was causing complications including kidney and liver failure in the infants.
“I think it’s one of the worst cases of corporate greed and malfeasance in history,” Brender said.
The drug which was manufactured by Carter-Glogau Laboratories of Glendale, Ariz., and its distributor O’Neal, Jones & Feldman Pharmaceuticals of Maryland Heights, Mo., are no longer in business. The attorney who representing the companies, said both stopped doing business about 20 years ago but that their liability insurance would pay the settlement.
Taylor said his clients were relieved to get a resolution.
One of the problems was that dosage instructions were unclear and the more doses an infant was given, the higher the probability of injury or death. Many children who received the supplement were not harmed most likely because they received a low dosage.
Indictments were handed down in 1987 for Carter-Glogau and its former president, Ronald M. Carter, along with the former president of O’Neal, Larry K. Hiland. They were convicted of conspiracy, marketing an unapproved drug and misbranding the drug. The company was fined $130,000 in 1989, and both executives were sentenced to 6 months in jail.