2024-04-13 00:17:22
Sixteen pharmaceutical companies that market or distribute opioids in Quebec will have to defend themselves in a class action brought on behalf of patients whose lives have been disrupted by these drugs.
The class action was authorized on Wednesday, the law firms Fishman Flanz Meland Paquin LLP (FFMP) and Trudel Johnston & Lspérance (TJL) announced on Friday.
“Thanks to this important judgment, the victims […] now have a way to seek and obtain legitimate compensation for harm caused to them by pharmaceutical companies,” commented Mark E. Meland, Partner at FFMP.
The class action includes all Quebecers who have been diagnosed with an opioid use disorder since 1996. The legal procedure, however, excludes the medications OxyContin and OxyNEO, as well as opioids available only in hospitals.
Opioids, which include many substances from morphine to fentanyl, are at the heart of Canada’s overdose crisis. Since 2016, more than 40,000 Canadians have died from opioid overdoses. About 80% died following ingesting fentanyl, alone or with other drugs.
The majority of deaths occurred in British Columbia, Alberta and Ontario, but the crisis is also gradually spreading to Quebec.
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