A new individual Actos bladder cancer lawsuit has joined the group litigation over allegations that the type-2 diabetes drug Actos can increase a person’s risk of developing bladder cancer.

Plaintiff George C. Rauseao Jr. has filed the Actos lawsuit against Actos maker Takeda Pharmaceuticals.

Rauseo began taking the drug in 2010, under a physician’s direction, to help control his type-2 diabetes, he explains in his Actos lawsuit. In 2013, Rauseo was diagnosed with bladder cancer, a potentially life-threatening form of cancer.

As a result of the bladder cancer diagnosis, Rauseo required several surgeries to remove cancerous tumors from his bladder, causing him severe pain and suffering.

Rauseo’s Actos lawsuit — and thousands of similar Actos bladder cancer lawsuits — have alleged that Takeda officials were aware, or reasonably should have been aware, of the risk of bladder cancer allegedly linked to their drug.

He claims that the Actos drug maker was legally obligated to thoroughly test Actos for safety and monitor postmarket reports and studies for signs of problems. Rauseo’s Actos bladder cancer lawsuit states that nearly half a decade before he was prescribed the drug, there were already signs that Actos could be linked to serious problems.

A 2005 study, called PROactive (“PROspective PioglitAzonew Clinical Trial In MacroVascular Events”) actually set out to study the drug’s effect on heart disease. However, in the course of the research, the study’s authors found evidence that the drug was linked to an increased risk of developing bladder cancer.

In a similar time frame, the Food and Drug Administration (FDA) stumbled onto similar results when looking at the effects of the drug on the liver.

In 2010, Actos began facing regulatory action across the globe. In Germany, France, Japan, and Canada, various nations’ regulatory agencies either banned, withdrew, or warned against new prescriptions of Actos. In the United States, the FDA issued a series of statements warning of the risk of bladder cancer linked to Actos.

The Actos bladder cancer lawsuits have taken the form of a type of group lawsuit called a multidistrict litigation (MDL) or mass tort. MDLs are a kind of group lawsuit, similar in some ways to a class action lawsuit.

In both MDLs and class action lawsuits, a number of plaintiffs allege that they have suffered similar harm at the hands of the same defendant. The main differences between a class action lawsuit and an MDL is that class action lawsuits are filed as group lawsuits from the beginning, while MDLs start as individual lawsuits, which are later coordinated into a single MDL.

The Actos Bladder Cancer Lawsuit is George C. Rauseo Jr. v. Takeda Pharamceuticals USA Incorporated, et al., Case No. 6:14-cv-01207-RFD-PJH filed within the Actos Mass Tort In Re: Actos Products Liability Litigation, MDL No. 6:11-md-2299, in the U.S. District Court for the Western District of Louisiana.

In general, Actos bladder cancer lawsuits are filed individually by each plaintiff and are not class actions.

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