September 10, 2008

In a closely watched case (see Jun. 30), Maryland's highest court declined to create a new duty of drugmakers toward third parties who might be injured by persons who take their drugs. The case arose after a diabetic driver who had been prescribed an Eli Lilly insulin product suffered an adverse reaction and ran into the vehicle of a prominent Prince George's County, Md. politician, killing him. The case raised several other issues of which one was pre-emption, as Beck and Herrmann explain. (Examiner; decision, PDF courtesy NAM).