Safeway/Trazodone

On behalf of Safeway, Jonathan Allan Klein and Annmarie Liermann recently obtained an Order sustaining a Demurrer filed on Safeway’s behalf in a Trazodone case filed in Alameda County, California. The Court agreed with our arguments, in their entirety, that California pharmacies do not have a general duty to warn of the side effects of prescriptions (absent a special contraindication, or failure to follow the instructions on the prescription). The Court agreed with our analysis of out-of-state authority, and the application of the learned intermediary doctrine, in declining to establish a new duty of care on behalf of pharmacies and pharmacists. To counsel’s knowledge, this is the first decision in California explicitly holding that pharmacies are protected by the learned intermediary doctrine while sustaining a demurrer to a duty to warn claim. A copy of the Order is attached.