A Tennessee woman filed a Zoloft birth defect lawsuit against Pfizer on behalf of injuries sustained by her daughter, a minor.

During her pregnancy plaintiff Rachel Cable took Zoloft, and claims that the drug caused the birth defects and other conditions her daughter now suffers. Cable says she was unaware of the dangers of taking Zoloft during pregnancy.

According to the Zoloft lawsuit, Cable’s daughter, referred to in the claim as S.C., was born on July 15, 2003. S.C. was born suffering from serious birth defects, including heart defects, allegedly as a result of her mother ingesting Zoloft.

Cable says had she or her healthcare providers had known of the increased risk of congenital birth defects, she would not have taken Zoloft during her pregnancy. She adds that Pfizer knew, or should have known, that Zoloft causes serious birth defects, but nowhere did they “include adequate warnings, instructions and directions relating to the dangerous risks associated with the use of Zoloft” on their label.

Her Zoloft lawsuit states that “prior to FDA approval of Zoloft, Pfizer knew that Zoloft caused birth defects when administered to non-human mammalian species.” As such, it “would have shown them that the drug crosses the placenta and, thereby, poses significant risks to the developing fetus.”

The birth defect lawsuit adds that “Pfizer knew of studies within the same class of drugs demonstrating that mothers exposed to SSRIs late in their pregnancies showed significantly higher rates of prematurity, poor neonatal adaptation, significantly lower mean birth weight and length, and PPHN.”

Pfizer should have known, therefore, of the risk that children could be born with congenital birth defects to women who took Zoloft during pregnancy. But despite Pfizer’s knowledge of the danger of birth defects, Cable’s Zoloft lawsuit continues, Pfizer “failed and continues to fail to warn and disclose to consumers.”

For her daughter, and other unknowing mothers out there, Cable is suing Pfizer for defective design, failure to warn, negligence, negligent misrepresentation, fraud, fraudulent misrepresentation and concealment, and for breach of implied and express warranty.

The Zoloft Birth Defect lawsuit is Rachel Cable v. Pfizer Inc., under the current MDL In re: Zoloft (Sertraline Hydrochloride) Products Liability Litigation, MDL No. 2342, in the U.S. District Court for the Eastern District of Pennsylvania.

Anti-Depressents & Birth Defects

The prescription drug Sertraline is manufactured, distributed, and labeled by Pfizer under the trade name Zoloft. It is a member of a class of antidepressants known as “selective serotonin reuptake inhibitors,” or SSRIs. SSRIs impact serotonin levels, and are the first class of psychotropic drugs discovered using a process called rational drug design.

In rational drug design, a molecule is designed to affect a specific biological target. Being so direct in treatment, many patients have reported suffering fewer emotional swings and physical side effects from SSRIs than from other mood altering medications.

Zoloft was approved in 1991 by the U.S. Food and Drug Administration (FDA) to treat Major Depressive Disorder (MDD). It was later approved to treat a number of other depressive and mood disorders, like obsessive-compulsive disorder (OCD) and post-traumatic stress disorder (PTSD).