AstraZeneca settles on £124m for drug claims

AstraZeneca yesterday agreed to pay $198 million (£124m) to settle some 17,500 personal injury claims in the United States related to Seroquel, its schizophrenia and bipolar disorder drug.

The top-selling medicine, which had worldwide sales of $4.9 billion in 2009, accounting for about 15 per cent of group revenue, has been subject to long-running legal claims after being linked to an increased risk of diabetes.

The average payout of $11,300 (7,089) per claim is modest by comparison with some past medicine settlements. A further 2,900 cases have been dismissed.

The group did not have a provision for Seroquel settlements as of 30 June but it said the agreements would not affect its 2010 outlook for "core" earnings, since any provision would be disregarded in calculating this underlying measure of profit.

The UK-Swedish drugmaker raised its forecast for core earnings per share last month after reporting strong second-quarter results.

News of the settlements came as little surprise since sources had said last week that some 5,500 claims had been settled, at that stage, for $55m (34.5m) as part of an ongoing process of mediation.

A company spokeswoman said: "We believe it was in the best interest of the company to explore resolving these cases through the mediation process.

"We remain committed to a strong defence effort, but will also continue to participate in court-ordered mediation."