The third quarter Bayer stockholder’s newsletter provided the following update about the YAZ®, YASMIN®, Ocella™ and Gianvi® liability litigation ongoing in the U.S.:As of October 15, 2012, the number of lawsuits pending in the United States and served upon Bayer was about 12,400. In addition, about 720 asserted claims were pending that have not been filed in court. The number of claimants in the pending lawsuits and claims totaled about 13,500 (excluding claims already settled). Claimants allege that they have suffered personal injuries, some of them fatal, from the use of Bayer’s drospirenone-containing oral contraceptive products such as YASMIN and YAZ, respectively, marketed by Barr Laboratories, Inc., in the United States. As of October 15, 2012, Bayer had reached agreements, without admission of liability, to settle the claims of about 3,490 claimants in the U.S. for a total amount of about $750 million. Bayer is only settling claims in the U.S. for venous clot injuries (deep vein thrombosis or pulmonary embolism) after a case-specific analysis of medical records on a rolling basis. Such injuries are alleged by about 3,800 of the pending unsettled claimants.
The report further states that Bayer has taken appropriate accounting measures for anticipated defense cost and for agreed and anticipated future settlements based on the information currently available and based on the number of pending claims alleging venous clot injuries. Bayer is insured against products liability risk to the extent customary in the industry; however, the accounting measures include an amount in excess of the available insurance coverage. For the accounting measures exceeding the insurance coverage, Bayer recorded expenses totaling about $0.7 billion, which equals approximately $907.4 million in U.S. currency as of 11/26/12, in the second and third quarters of 2012.
