The hearing that took place on September 24th to determine whether or not Yaz cases should be combined into multidistrict litigation (MDL) has been decided. The Judicial Panel on MultiDistrict Litigation (JPML) approved MDL-2100, “In Re: Yasmin and YAZ (Drospirenone) Marketing, Sales Practices and Products Liability Litigation” on October 1st.

What does this mean for plaintiffs? It means that all cases filed or that will be filed in this matter will be transferred to one court–in this case the US District Court for the Southern District of Illinois for pre-trial proceedings. This will enable plaintiffs attorneys to spend more time working with clients and doing discovery (the process by which they find out more information from Bayer), rather than working on case management.

An MDL is not a class action lawsuit. After pre-trial proceedings (such as hearings and motions) are completed, the cases will all be remanded back to their original courts for trial.