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$64 Million Baxter Settlement Brings Plasma-Derivative Protein Antitrust Cases to a Conclusion: Total Awards of $128 Million
[April 21, 2014]

$64 Million Baxter Settlement Brings Plasma-Derivative Protein Antitrust Cases to a Conclusion: Total Awards of $128 Million


CHICAGO --(Business Wire)--

A federal judge last week granted final approval of the $64 million settlement between plaintiffs in a blood plasma derivatives price-fixing case against Baxter International, Inc., and Baxter Healthcare Corporation. This marks the final settlement in In Re Plasma-Derivative Protein Therapies Antitrust Litigation and brings the total amount recovered by Plaintiffs to $128 million.

Earlier this year, U.S. District Judge Joan B. Gottschall, Northern District of Illinois, also approved a settlement between plaintiffs and defendants CSL Limited, CSL Behring LLC, CSL Plasma Inc., and the Plasma Protein Therapeutics Association in the identical amount of $64 million.

The case involves allegations that between 2003 and 2009 the companies ageed to restrict the supply of the blood plasma derivatives immunoglobulin and albumin, and thereby increase the prices of those therapies, according to attorneys at Cohen Milstein Sellers & Toll PLLC and Williams, Montgomery & John Ltd.



Co-Lead Counsel Charles Tompkins, of Williams, Montgomery & John Ltd, said of the settlements, "the result obtained on behalf of the corporate clients we represent here is one that fairly compensates them for the losses they suffered without the need for further protracted litigation."

Added Co-Lead Counsel Richard Koffman, of Cohen Milstein, "the resolution of this litigation is an outstanding result that achieves justice for more than 2,000 class members. The settlements have been very well received by the many class members to whom I have spoken, which I find deeply gratifying."


The case is In re Plasma-Derivative Protein Therapies Antitrust Litigation, No. 09 C 7666, http://www.cohenmilstein.com/cases/191/plasma-derivative-protein-therapies-blood-plasma


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