A federal judge ruled that a widely...
A federal judge ruled that a widely used spermicide caused birth defects in a girl and ordered the manufacturer to pay $5.1 million in damages to the child and her mother. U.S. District Judge Marvin Shoob ruled in Atlanta that Ortho Pharmaceutical Corp. of Raritan, N.J., which makes Ortho-Gynol Contraceptive Jelly, should have warned its users that birth defects can result from conceptions that the gel fails to prevent. Expert witnesses for the plaintiffs, Mary Maihafer and her daughter, Mary Wells, 3, testified that the gel can damage sperm while failing to kill it.
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