Plaintiff. a neighbor of a chemical plant in Delaware, sued the plant alleging that it had released carcinogenic ethylene oxide gas into the air; plaintiff proposed a class action, asserting claims for strict liability, negligence, and private and public nuisance. The United States District Court for the District of Delaware granted plant’s motion to dismiss
Medical Monitoring
Medical Monitoring
Readers know of our interest in medical monitoring, an interest which dates back to trying a medical monitoring class action to a defense jury verdict decades ago. Your humble blogger co-authored the Medical Monitoring chapter in American Bar Association’s A Practitioner’s Guide to Class Actions, Third Edition.
Our friends at the highly regarded Drug…
Illinois Rejects Medical Monitoring Too
Our long time readers know that medical monitoring is a frequent topic here, probably because as a young (younger?) lawyer we got an opportunity to help try a medical monitoring class action to defense jury verdict.
In the years since then, several states have weighed in on the availability of medical monitoring, which refers to future medical testing of a plaintiff who has not suffered a manifest traditional physical injury, but who has been exposed to a hazardous substance or product and claims to therefore be at increased risk of contracting a future disease or injury; the plaintiff is then monitored periodically with appropriate medical testing to facilitate early detection and diagnosis of that possible future consequence. Medical monitoring thus turns on the notion of latency, the time between exposure and manifestation of a symptomatic or detectable injury. See Sutton v. St. Jude Med. S.C., Inc., 419 F.3d 568, 571 (6th Cir. 2005) (“A medical monitoring award aids presently healthy plaintiffs who have been exposed to an increased risk of future harm to detect and treat any resultant harm at an early stage.”).
The general trend has been against the recognition of the claim/remedy, and the latest word on the subject comes from the Illinois Supreme Court in a proposed proposed class action by Chicago residents claiming the city failed to warn them of lead exposure in their drinking water. Berry v. City of Chicago, 2020 IL 124999, 2020 WL 5668974 (Ill. Sept. 24, 2020).
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“The Rise of Empty Suit Litigation”
Two of my partners here at SHB, Victor Schwartz (of the famed “Schwartz on Torts” casebook) and Cary Silverman, just published a new artic…
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Medical Monitoring Class Action Rejected at Pleading Stage
A federal court recently rejected a proposed medical monitoring class action brought by alleged Pepsi drinkers. The case reminds readers of the import…
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Federal Court Denies Certification in Groundwater Class Case
A federal judge in Oklahoma earlier this week denied class certification to homeowners living near a research facility, holding that individual issues…
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Summary Judgment Affirmed in Medical Monitoring Class Action
The First Circuit has affirmed a district court ruling rejecting a proposed class action seeking medical monitoring for alleged exposure to hazardous …
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Lone Pine Issue Moving to State Supreme Court
Readers know we have posted before about the important case management tool known as the “Lone PIne” order. These “Lone Pine” or…
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New York High Court Rejects Medical Monitoring
Just the facts on this one, as my firm is involved for defendants in such actions, but word comes that New York’s highest court has joined the trend o…
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Lone Pine Issue Appealed to State Supreme Court
Defendants in a fracking toxic tort case last week petitioned the Colorado Supreme Court to overrule an appeals court decision which had struck down a…
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