JPML Asked to Create Federal Docket for Oral Decongestant Cases

WASHINGTON, D.C. — The Judicial Panel on Multidistrict Litigation has been asked to create a federal docket for lawsuits alleging that makers of over-the-counter oral decongestants knew the drugs’ active ingredient, pseudoephedrine, is essentially a placebo, yet marketed them as effective.

In a Sept. 18 motion, plaintiffs in one of the class actions pending in the U.S. District Court for the District of New Jersey argue that all of the pending actions - 13 so far – allege substantially the same wrongful conduct on the part of the named defendants, which include Procter & Gamble, McNeil Consumer Healthcare, GlaxoSmithKline LLC …