Nearly 1,200 lawsuits nationwide against pharmaceutical giant Pfizer Inc. over its anti-smoking drug Chantix are being handled in U.S. District Court in Birmingham.

U.S. District Judge Inge Johnson is overseeing pre-trial activity in the cases in which smokers and their families claim that Chantix left them with a variety of psychological problems.

More suits are being filed daily from across the country.

In some cases, families say their loved ones committed suicide after taking the drug.

Pfizer denies their drug is responsible for those problems and defends the development and use of Chantix as a drug to help people stop smoking.

The United States Judicial Panel on Multidistrict Litigation in late 2009 assigned the cases to Johnson, who was already handling two of the cases.

The panel said that Johnson "has the time and experience to steer this litigation on a prudent course."

Since Johnson was appointed, the number of Chantix cases filed in federal court has grown from 37 to nearly 1,200 as of Monday, according to court records. Last week, 26 were filed and a few officials said the number is expected to eventually top 2,000 cases.

Since the MDL panel was created in 1968, federal judges in the northern district of Alabama have handled six other MDL cases. Among them were the lawsuits filed over silicone gel breast implants, which was terminated in 2003 and involved more than 26,000 lawsuits.

Smokers claim in the lawsuits that after taking Chantix they've experienced a wide variety of conditions, including anxiety, aggressiveness and suicidal thoughts.

Suicidal thoughts

About 60 percent of the cases filed nationwide so far allege an overt act of injury to themselves, either suicide or attempted suicide, said Ernest Cory, a Birmingham lawyer who is the lead plaintiffs' counsel for all cases filed in federal courts across the country. "That is a scary number of folks," he said.

Pfizer officials have denied the allegations.

"Pfizer acted responsibly and appropriately at all times in connection with the development, approval and marketing of Chantix," said Victoria Davis, spokeswoman for Pfizer. "There is no reliable scientific evidence that Chantix causes the neuropsychiatric events alleged in these lawsuits. Chantix is an effective treatment option for many smokers who want to quit, and we intend to defend this important medication."

Of the approximately 1,200 lawsuits filed so far, 21 have been from Alabama, according to Cory's office.

Once the drug was released on the market in 2006, a number of Chantix users began complaining about mental problems, and the FDA received thousands of complaints of adverse effects associated with the drug, Cory said.

Warnings added

The FDA responded to complaints with a series of labeling changes and in 2008 required Pfizer to put what is called a black box warning on the drug for doctors and patients to warn of the possible problems if the drug is used, he said.

Among the lawsuits are the cases of two Alabama residents -- one man and a woman -- who lived in two north Alabama counties who began taking Chantix in the weeks and months before they committed suicide in 2007.

Among the claims in the lawsuits is that, during the clinical trial phase of testing Chantix, Pfizer excluded people who had any history of mental illness, Cory said, thereby excluding a huge population of smokers. That, Cory said, effectively made those smokers guinea pigs when the drug was approved for use. The drug was designed to suppress the desire to smoke.

In MDL cases the judges sometimes will see the cases through much of the pre-trial motions, depositions and discovery and then send cases back to the federal district where they were filed for the trial.

Other times the judges will select certain bellwether cases to go to trial before them that represent some of the most common issues in the lawsuits. The idea is that having the results of those test cases may help the plaintiffs and defendants decide whether to settle or continue pursuing their cases.

The MDL process aims to consolidate civil lawsuits with similar claims under judges who will oversee trial preparation to eliminate duplication and inconsistent rulings, and save money for plaintiffs, defendants and the courts.

The selection of bellwether cases and the location of the trials have not been decided in the Chantix cases, Judge Johnson said Monday.

The first depositions of Pfizer employees and others are to begin in the first quarter of the year, according to court filings.

Cory said he expects the first case will be tried in 2012. "In all likelihood the first Chantix case to be tried in the country will be tried before Judge Johnson," he said.

Tripp Haston, counsel for Pfizer and a partner in the Birmingham office of Bradley Arant Boult Cummings, declined comment on what the judge might do. "The court and the parties have not yet had an opportunity to discuss any potential bellwether process, so it's too early to comment on that issue," he said.

"This MDL is in its earliest procedural stages," Haston said in an e-mailed statement. "That means we haven't yet received important information from the plaintiffs about their claims, including their alleged Chantix usage, whether Chantix helped them quit smoking, and whether or to what extent they had experienced the claimed psychiatric issues long before they started taking Chantix. As a result, it is premature at this point to comment on any specific case."

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