"Guardians of opioid-dependent babies seek MDL class certification before Judge Polster" 7 Jan 2020

Attorneys representing America’s most innocent victims in the nation’s prescription opioid crisis took a significant step today within the Multi-District Litigation before Judge Daniel Polster in Cleveland, Ohio by seeking class certification of the guardians responsible for children injured by in-utero exposure to opioids and diagnosed with Neo-Natal Abstinence System or drug dependence.

States, cities, municipalities, hospitals and Native Americans have already gained such class certification status. Those classes do not include guardians of children who were born with Neo-Natal Abstinence Syndrome or drug dependent.

This would be the first-time children diagnosed with Neonatal Abstinence Syndrome, due to the opioid use of their birth mothers, would finally have redress of the lifelong physical and development disabilities and defects these children do and will experience, said Attorney Scott Bickford. 

The legal filing, with supporting evidence from leading medical experts in the areas of NAS and the scientific relationship between in-utero opioid exposure and birth defects, puts forth studies and testimony to support these arguments, making these main points: 

• The nation is vastly undercounting the number of NAS babies..
• Babies are sent home from hospitals to guardians with little awareness of what the child and caregiver will face. While physical deformities may be evident when a baby is born, the growing medical science in the NAS area shows opioid exposure in the womb impacts brain size and development which results in long-term developmental effects such delays in walking, talking, hyperactivity...