For Immediate Release
Company name: DAIICHI SANKYO COMPANY, LIMITED
Representative: Sunao Manabe, Representative Director, President and COO
(Code no.: 4568, First Section, Tokyo Stock Exchange)
Please address inquiries to Noriaki Ishida, Executive Officer,
Vice President, Corporate Communications Department
Telephone: +81-3-6225-1126
http://www.daiichisankyo.com
Daiichi Sankyo Agrees to Modify the Terms of the Settlement Program for U.S. Olmesartan Products Liability Litigation
Tokyo, Japan – March 30, 2018: Daiichi Sankyo Company, Limited announced that it has reached an agreement to modify certain aspects of the settlement program, which was entered into and announced on August 1, 2017, EST on behalf of all defendants, resolving pending product liability litigation related to olmesartan products (Benicar, Benicar HCT, Azor and Tribenzor) against various Daiichi Sankyo and Forest entities. The lawsuits allege that these products caused sprue-like enteropathy and other severe gastro-intestinal symptoms.
The settlement program now requires, among other previously agreed-upon thresholds, that at least 97 percent of all eligible litigants and claimants decide to opt-in to the settlement under certain conditions. At this time, the only claimants eligible to proceed to opt-in to the settlement program are those who have complied with the requirements of the Court and who have already registered with the program. Once the settlement program achieves the predetermined thresholds, and following a review of claims by a Claims Administrator, claimants who meet the specified criteria will receive payouts from the settlement fund, which is now capped at $358 million.
The impact to the financial position of the company is not considered material because the settlement fund is expected to be comprised primarily of proceeds from several of Daiichi Sankyo Group’s insurance companies supplemented with company funds.
The Company continues to believe that the claims made in this litigation are without merit, and does not admit liability. Daiichi Sankyo’s medications that contain olmesartan medoxomil remain widely used by patients with hypertension in the U.S. Olmesartan medoxomil is an angiotensin II receptor blocker (ARB) approved for the treatment of high blood pressure, alone or with other antihypertensive agents, and is one of eight marketed ARB drugs. The olmesartan medoxomil family of products used for the treatment of hypertension has a well-established safety profile with more than 53 million patient-years of use worldwide since 2002.