Birth control packaging allegedly leads to accidental pregnancies: Lawsuit

More than 100 women have a filed a lawsuit alleging that incorrect packaging of birth control pills led to all but four of the women having unwanted pregnancies.

The women filed the class action lawsuit in Pennsylvania, claiming that Qualitest Pharmaceuticals — a subsidiary of Endo Pharmaceuticals — and its manufacturers distributed defective birth control pill packets in 2011, causing 113 accidental pregnancies across 26 states, CBS News reported, adding that the case seeks millions of dollars in damages, including the costs of raising to adulthood children born from allegedly unplanned pregnancies.

Court documents suggest the women took the pills as directed, but they failed to prevent pregnancies because of a 180-degree packing error that reversed the orientation of the pills — meaning that women took placebo pills when they should have been taking active pills, CNN reported.

Cindy Pearson, the head of the National Women’s Health Network, said to CNN that generations of women have trusted birth controls pills to be packaged correctly, also stating, “When companies mess up, they need to do the right thing.”

In 2011, Endo Pharmaceuticals Inc.voluntarily recalled more than 500,000 birth control packets with the brand names Cyclafem, Emoquette, Gildess, Orsythia, Previfem and Tri-Previfem, NBC reported in a related article.

“The voluntary recall occurred based on an extremely small number of pill packs that were manufactured by an external contract manufacturer,”Endo spokeswoman Heather Zoumas Lubeski said to NBC. “Endo has been able to confirm only one blister pack that manifested a defect and was sold to a patient.”

Laws in some states allow women to sue over the cost of raising a child to age 18, lawyer Keith Bodoh of Marietta, Georgia, who filed the Philadelphia lawsuit, said to NBC, which added that damages in a few states could include the cost of college.