Lawyers for plaintiffs in the In Re Zantac (Ranitidine) Products Liability Litigation have submitted court filings alleging that Sanofi has destroyed internal emails which are tied to the 2019 recall of its Zantac medication. Lawyers argue that amongst the deleted emails are those from Sanofi’s head of regulatory affairs, which will make it difficult for consumers to show that the drug maker allowed a carcinogenic to taint its product. Sanofi officials must now submit a report to the judge, and have begun an internal probe.
In 2018 the FDA found that Zantac contained dangerous levels of N-nitrosodimethylamine (NMDA), a substance closely linked to cancer. In what has been one of the largest case consolidations in the U.S., more than 1,300 suits by 70,000 former users have been brought together before the United States District Court for the Southern District of Florida. Former Zantac users argue that the FDA allowed for a daily limit of 96 nanograms of NMDA, yet researchers found more than 3 million nanograms in doses of Zantac.