The New Pharmaceutical Litigation

What It Is and Where It Is Going

Tuesday, June 18, 2002 | 10:00 a.m. – 11:15 a.m.

Wohlstetter Conference Center, Twelfth Floor, AEI 1150 Seventeenth Street, N.W., Washington, D.C. 20036

About This Event

During the past two or three years pharmaceutical-related litigation has increased dramatically. It also has shifted its focus to Medicaid and Medicare drug reimbursement rates, the introduction of generic drugs when branded drug patents expire, and marketing practices directed at health care organizations.

Much of this litigation began as actions by individual state and local governments or the federal government, most notably an $800 million settlement of a federal action involving a single product. This success has spurred numerous consumer class action suits, coordinated efforts by state attorneys general, litigation by health care organizations, and vigorous litigation support from AARP.

What does the new litigation environment--and its costs--mean for taxpayers and consumers? Is the pharmaceutical industry facing an onslaught similar to the one launched against the tobacco industry in the 1990s? Discussing these issues are AEI resident scholar John E. Calfee and Michael S. Greve, the John G. Searle Scholar and director of the Federalism Project at AEI.

Agenda

9:45 a.m.	Registration
10:00	Panelists:	John E. Calfee, AEI
		Michael S. Greve, AEI
11:15	Adjournment

Greve's Remarks

Also Visit

What's new on AEI

	Unleash the private sector
	The difference it will make
	How the R&D tax credit is like duct tape
	From Beijing to Jerusalem

AEI Participants

John E.
Calfee

Economist John E. Calfee (1941-2011) studied the pharmaceutical industry and the Food and Drug Administration (FDA), along with the economics of tobacco, tort liability, and patents. He previously worked at the Federal Trade Commission's Bureau of Economics. He had also taught marketing and consumer behavior at the business schools of the University of Maryland at College Park and Boston University. While Mr. Calfee's writings are mostly on pharmaceutical markets and FDA regulation, his academic articles and opinion pieces covered a variety of topics, from patent law and tort liability to advertising and consumer information. His books include Prices, Markets, and the Pharmaceutical Revolution (AEI Press, 2000) and Biotechnology and the Patent System (AEI Press, 2007). Mr. Calfee wrote regularly for AEI's Health Policy Outlook series. He testified before Congress and federal agencies on various topics, including alcohol advertising; biodefense vaccine research; international drug prices; and FDA oversight of drug safety.

Michael S.
Greve

Michael S. Greve is a professor at George Mason University School of Law. From 2000 to August, 2012, Professor Greve was the John G. Searle Scholar at the American Enterprise Institute, where he remains a visiting scholar. Before coming to AEI, Professor Greve cofounded and, from 1989 to 2000, directed the Center for Individual Rights, a public interest law firm. He holds a Ph.D. and M.A. in government from Cornell University, and completed his undergraduate studies at the University of Hamburg. Currently, Professor Greve also chairs the board of the Competitive Enterprise Institute and is a frequent contributor to the Liberty Law Blog.

Professor Greve has written extensively on many aspects of the American legal system. His publications include numerous law review articles and books, including most recently The Upside-Down Constitution (Harvard University Press, 2012). He has also written The Demise of Environmentalism in American Law (1996); Real Federalism: Why It Matters, How It Could Happen (1999); and Harm-less Lawsuits? What's Wrong With Consumer Class Actions (2005). He is the coeditor, with Richard A. Epstein, of Competition Laws in Conflict: Antitrust Jurisdiction in the Global Economy (2004) and Federal Preemption: States' Powers, National Interests (2007); and, with Michael Zoeller, of Citizenship in America and Europe: Beyond the Nation-State? (2009).