The government and five drug companies have agreed to a court-proposed settlement of lawsuits by Japanese who contracted the AIDS virus from contaminated blood products, officials said Thursday.
The lawsuits were filed in 1989 by about 400 HIV-infected hemophiliacs who sought compensation and payment for medical bills. They said the government continued to allow use of unheated blood products in Japan after it already knew that heat-treating killed the AIDS virus.Health Minister Naoto Kan acknowledged government responsibility for the infection of Japanese hemophiliacs for the first time last month. Many were youngsters who used tainted blood products between 1983 and 1985.
A Health Ministry official, speaking Thursday on condition of anonymity, said details of the settlement would be announced Friday.
However, some details emerged from the companies involved.
Baxter International, based in Deerfield, Ill., announced late Wednesday in the United States that it had accepted the terms of the settlement. German giant Bayer AG's Japanese subsidiary, Bayer Yakuhin Ltd., made a similar announcement Thursday.
Three Japanese companies are also involved - Green Cross Corp., the Chemo Sero Therapeutic Research Institute and Nippon Zoki Pharmaceutical Co.
In a statement, Baxter said the settlement includes a one-time payment of about $426,000 to each claimant, plus monthly payments for life.
Forty-four percent of the cost would be borne by the Japanese government and the companies would pay 56 percent, Baxter said.
The settlement is in line with what the courts had proposed last October. Court-orchestrated settlements are common in Japan.
Bob Hurley, president of its Japanese subsidiary Baxter Ltd., said in a statement the company extended "heartfelt apologies to those people and their families who were the innocent victims of this insidious disease."
But he noted that Baxter had been trying to provide heat-treated products in Japan for nearly 21/2 years before the Japanese government agreed to their sale in Japan.
Bayer Yakuhin said it would take part in a final settlement, but the terms had not been finalized. Some legal and technical matters were "subject to further discussions," president Wolfgang Plischke said in a statement.
The government has come under heavy criticism for not approving the heat-treated products more quickly. Recent news reports have said officials knew of the risks as early as 1982.
Japanese authorities have begun investigations into possible cover-ups by pharmaceutical companies as well as possible criminal negligence by government officials.
Of an estimated 4,500 hemophiliacs in Japan, about 2,000 contracted the HIV virus in the early 1980s from unheated blood products imported mainly from the United States. Nearly half the plaintiffs have already died.