Dive Brief:
- A federal judge ruled on Thursday that a Johnson & Johnson subsidiary must pay $442 million in damages after a jury found last month that the company violated antitrust rules by withholding support to hospitals that bought reprocessed catheters.
- District Judge James Selna ruled that J&J must pay triple the $147 million in damages determined by the jury, as allowed under antitrust law. The amount is separate from costs and attorneys’ fees.
- Daniel Vukelich, CEO of the Association of Medical Device Reprocessors, said the ruling was “a seismic result.” A J&J spokesperson wrote in an email that the company plans to appeal but will comply with the ruling and any court-ordered relief in the meantime. “We strongly disagree with the jury’s verdict and believe it will not withstand appellate review,” the spokesperson wrote.
Dive Insight:
Innovative Health, which sells reprocessed catheters, filed the lawsuit against J&J subsidiary Biosense Webster in 2019. The company claimed J&J had a monopoly on heart-mapping catheters, and that it tied support for its Carto 3 mapping system to purchases of mapping and ultrasound catheters.
A jury found on May 16 that J&J had violated the Sherman Act and California’s Cartwright Act by withholding support from reprocessed versions of J&J’s catheters. Reprocessed devices have been used in a procedure before, and are disinfected or sterilized.
AMDR’s Vukelich said the ruling “sends an unmistakable message to all device manufacturers: anti-competitive, anti-reprocessing tactics won’t be tolerated by the courts or by hospitals committed to cost savings, sustainability, and patient care.”
The case was filed in the U.S. District Court for the Central District of California, Southern Division.
