Bloomberg reported Thursday that Takeda may face as many as 10 000 lawsuits in US courts over allegations that its Actos (pioglitazone) diabetes drug causes bladder cancer.

US regulators found in June that an analysis of a company-sponsored study showed some users of Actos, which generated sales of 387.9 billion yen ($4.8 billion) in the last fiscal year, faced an increased risk of developing the potentially disease.

Earlier this year, Takeda pulled Actos off the market in Germany and France because of the link to an increased risk of cancer.

Lawyer Paul J. Pennock, who represents 1200 former Actos users, was set to appear December 1 before a judicial panel in Savannah, Georgia, to argue that federal court suits over the drug should be consolidated for pretrial proceedings in Louisiana or Ohio.

The drugmaker declined to comment on the impact of the lawsuits to its earnings or whether it plans to set aside money for the litigation.

Takeda's lawyers said in a September court filing that so far it had been sued 54 times over Actos in federal courts around the US.
(Ref: Bloomberg)