NEW YORK (Legal Newsline) -- Pfizer Inc. has reportedly agreed to shelling out more than $300 million to settle thousands of lawsuits alleging one of its menopause drugs caused breast cancer.
Two people familiar with the settlement told Bloomberg News on Wednesday that Pfizer, the world's largest drug maker, would pay out about $330 million total or an average of about $150,000.
However, a spokesman for Pfizer told the news service on Wednesday that the terms "are not accurate."
According to Bloomberg, more than 6 million women took Prempro and other menopause or hormone replacement drugs before they were linked to cancer in a 2002 study.
Hormone replacement therapy involves taking either estrogen alone or estrogen in combination with progesterone or progestin, which is a synthetic hormone with effects similar to those of progesterone.
According to the National Cancer Institute's website, doctors may recommend menopausal hormones to counter some of the problems often associated with the onset of menopause -- including hot flashes, night sweats, sleeplessness -- or to prevent some long-term conditions that are more common in postmenopausal women, such as osteoporosis.
According to the two insiders, Pfizer faced more than 10,000 claims prior to settling. The settlements were reached in the last five months, they said.
Those 10,000 claims included more than 8,000 cases that were consolidated in federal court in Arkansas, in addition to other cases in Pennsylvania, Nevada and Minnesota courts.
One of the plaintiff attorneys is Stuart Calwell from Charleston.