A landmark lawsuit pitting breast cancer survivors against drug companies is helping shed light on problems allegedly caused by a pregnancy drug widely prescribed decades ago.
The drug, a synthetic form of estrogen called DES, or diethylstilbestrol, was prescribed in the 1940s until 1971 under more than a dozen different brand names to pregnant women experiencing everything from miscarriages to nausea.
Fast-forward 40 years later, and some of the daughters of those pregnant women are now adult women getting breast cancer at greatly elevated rates.
Fifty-three of them have joined together to sue 14 drug companies in Boston federal court, including pharmaceutical giants Bristol-Myers Squibb and Eli Lilly.
The lawsuit, together with a bombshell New England Journal of Medicine article published yesterday — which suggests that infertility is twice as common and that breast cancer risk is nearly doubled in “DES daughters” — has ushered in a new awareness of the drug after decades when its lingering effects went under the radar.
“Everyone has been in the dark,” Dr. Paul Roda, a Pennsylvania oncologist, told The Daily. “The medical community in general doesn’t understand [the] occurrence [of DES effects] unless they’re looking for it.”
DES ended up being proved useless for the ailments it was supposed to help, but its harmful effects on the pregnant women’s estimated 4 million offspring became clear over the years, with infertility and vaginal cancer in females and deformed penises in males.
The Boston lawsuit represents the first time so many women are suing former DES drugmakers over an alleged link to breast cancer, said Aaron Levine, the Washington, D.C.-based attorney heading the case.
Representing Eli Lilly, attorney John Brenner stated last month that “it’s something yet to be proven that DES exposure may ... increase the risk of developing breast cancer,” the Boston Globe reported.
Previous lawsuits over DES have focused on problems with infertility, said Levine, who has litigated more than 300 DES-related cases over 20 years.
If there’s a settlement in the federal case, which is now hearing expert testimony, there could be an avalanche of breast-cancer survivor lawsuits, said Dr. Roda, who believes DES can cause breast cancer. The “lawsuit may only be the tip of the iceberg,” he said.
It’s about time, many in the growing community of DES daughters are saying.
“There’s a lot riding on” the lawsuit, said Fran Howell, director of DES Action, an advocacy group. “If the judge rules in favor of DES daughters, that would be a very exciting thing. Many DES daughters have a real anger toward drug companies.”
Just ask Mary Kaye Kennedy. The Chicago area woman, 43, whose mother took DES in the late 60s, does not have breast cancer. But she had so much trouble getting pregnant that she had to use her retirement money to pay for seven infertility treatments.
Then, once she conceived, she lost a twin. Earlier, a precancerous piece of her uterus had to be removed.
Two years ago, her jaw dropped. She was able to trace her problems to the drug her mother took for two days in the ’60s for nausea, she said. Her mother didn’t even remember taking it.
Kennedy joined the ranks of bloggers documenting the aftereffects of DES. Now, she has two healthy boys, but worries they may be predisposed to cancer or other medical problems. Researchers have concerns about “DES grandchildren” but studies are rare.
She hopes more women and men will start asking their doctors questions about whether they could have been exposed to DES.
Hopefully they’ll get answers, unlike what happened to her while undergoing infertility treatments, Kennedy said. “I never had a doctor say a word to me [about DES]. I found a connection online.”
The drug, a synthetic form of estrogen called DES, or diethylstilbestrol, was prescribed in the 1940s until 1971 under more than a dozen different brand names to pregnant women experiencing everything from miscarriages to nausea.
Fast-forward 40 years later, and some of the daughters of those pregnant women are now adult women getting breast cancer at greatly elevated rates.
Fifty-three of them have joined together to sue 14 drug companies in Boston federal court, including pharmaceutical giants Bristol-Myers Squibb and Eli Lilly.
The lawsuit, together with a bombshell New England Journal of Medicine article published yesterday — which suggests that infertility is twice as common and that breast cancer risk is nearly doubled in “DES daughters” — has ushered in a new awareness of the drug after decades when its lingering effects went under the radar.
“Everyone has been in the dark,” Dr. Paul Roda, a Pennsylvania oncologist, told The Daily. “The medical community in general doesn’t understand [the] occurrence [of DES effects] unless they’re looking for it.”
DES ended up being proved useless for the ailments it was supposed to help, but its harmful effects on the pregnant women’s estimated 4 million offspring became clear over the years, with infertility and vaginal cancer in females and deformed penises in males.
The Boston lawsuit represents the first time so many women are suing former DES drugmakers over an alleged link to breast cancer, said Aaron Levine, the Washington, D.C.-based attorney heading the case.
Representing Eli Lilly, attorney John Brenner stated last month that “it’s something yet to be proven that DES exposure may ... increase the risk of developing breast cancer,” the Boston Globe reported.
Previous lawsuits over DES have focused on problems with infertility, said Levine, who has litigated more than 300 DES-related cases over 20 years.
If there’s a settlement in the federal case, which is now hearing expert testimony, there could be an avalanche of breast-cancer survivor lawsuits, said Dr. Roda, who believes DES can cause breast cancer. The “lawsuit may only be the tip of the iceberg,” he said.
It’s about time, many in the growing community of DES daughters are saying.
“There’s a lot riding on” the lawsuit, said Fran Howell, director of DES Action, an advocacy group. “If the judge rules in favor of DES daughters, that would be a very exciting thing. Many DES daughters have a real anger toward drug companies.”
Just ask Mary Kaye Kennedy. The Chicago area woman, 43, whose mother took DES in the late 60s, does not have breast cancer. But she had so much trouble getting pregnant that she had to use her retirement money to pay for seven infertility treatments.
Then, once she conceived, she lost a twin. Earlier, a precancerous piece of her uterus had to be removed.
Two years ago, her jaw dropped. She was able to trace her problems to the drug her mother took for two days in the ’60s for nausea, she said. Her mother didn’t even remember taking it.
Kennedy joined the ranks of bloggers documenting the aftereffects of DES. Now, she has two healthy boys, but worries they may be predisposed to cancer or other medical problems. Researchers have concerns about “DES grandchildren” but studies are rare.
She hopes more women and men will start asking their doctors questions about whether they could have been exposed to DES.
Hopefully they’ll get answers, unlike what happened to her while undergoing infertility treatments, Kennedy said. “I never had a doctor say a word to me [about DES]. I found a connection online.”
