The federal government is playing Indian giver and wants to recover millions of dollars it spent treating thousands of women allegedly injured by silicone breast implants, and it's trying to get in line ahead of the women for its money.
The Justice Department on Friday sued six companies and a settlement fund that the companies set up to compensate women claiming injury by the implants. The lawsuit, filed in Birmingham, Ala., seeks to recover money spent by Medicare and other federal health care plans to treat silicone breast implant injuries.
It asked that the money come out of the settlement fund, and it called on the court to halt settlement payments to those who use federal health plans until the federal government gets reimbursed for its costs.
As of last April, 81,000 women had been sent payments from the settlement fund, which is expected to operate for 15 years. The Food and Drug Administration banned most use of silicone gel-filled breast implants in 1992.
The lawsuit did not put an exact figure on how much the government is seeking, but a Justice Department statement said it was in the millions of dollars.
The Medical Care Recovery Act permits the government to recover the cost of providing medical care to people injured as a result of the wrongful acts of a third party, the department said.
The government ``demands payments from the MDL (multi-district litigation) settlement fund of its reasonable costs or providing to or paying for hospital, medical, surgical or dental care on behalf of claimants who were, or will be paid through the MDL settlement fund and-or the common benefit fund for injuries alleged to be caused by a breast implant,'' the lawsuit said.
Justice spokesman Charles Miller said the lawsuit took this form because negotiations to recover the money from the implant manufacturers had been unsuccessful after several years of talks.
The government said the class action settlement provided women with $3,000 for surgery to remove the implants and additional payments for those with diseases or injuries allegedly caused by the implants.
Of the women who have received payments from the fund, 17,000 got $3,000 for removal surgery, the lawsuit said. An additional 26,000 women also received payment for a breast implant-related disease and another 10,000 received a one-time $2,500 payment to waive all future claims.
As of last May, 52,118 implant recipients had refused to join the class action, preserving their right to press their claims individually, the lawsuit said.
It said the companies and the settlement fund administrator failed to determine whether any of the women making claims had been Medicare beneficiaries before sending them payments from the settlement fund. And it said the defendants had not paid the government on behalf of any Medicare-treated women who obtained settlement payments.
The companies named in the lawsuit were Baxter International Inc., Baxter Healthcare Corp., Bristol-Meyers-Squibb Co., 3M Co., Union Carbide Chemical and Plastics Co., and Union Carbide Corp. Edgar C. Gentile III was named in his capacity as escrow agent of the settlement fund.
