Lilly settles sisters' cancer suit

ASSOCIATED PRESS
Posted: January 10, 2013

BOSTON - Four sisters with breast cancer who claimed in a lawsuit that their cancer was caused by synthetic estrogen that their mother took during pregnancy in the 1950s have reached a settlement with the drug company Eli Lilly and Co.

Attorney Julie Oliver-Zhang said that the settlement, for an undisclosed amount, was reached on Wednesday, the second day of a trial in U.S. District Court in Boston. The sisters had not specified damages sought in the lawsuit.

Indianapolis-based Eli Lilly said that it still believes its medication didn't cause the sisters' conditions but that a settlement is in its best interest.

The sisters' case was the first to go to trial out of scores of similar claims filed in Boston and around the country. Fifty-one women have lawsuits pending in U.S. District Court in Boston against more than a dozen companies that made or marketed the drug.

DES, or diethylstilbestrol, was prescribed to millions of pregnant women over three decades to prevent miscarriages, premature births and other problems. It was taken off the market in the early 1970s after being linked to a rare vaginal cancer in women whose mothers used DES. Studies later showed that the drug did not prevent miscarriages.

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