American Home Products v. Ferrari

Case Updates

Disagreeing with NCLC, the Georgia Supreme Court affirmed the intermediate appellate court’s holding that the National Childhood Vaccine Injury Compensation Act (NCVI-CA) does not expressly preempt all design defect claims. However, the Court agreed with NCLC that the U.S. Supreme Court’s decision in Bates v. Dow Agrosciences, LLC does not support an unrebuttable presumption against preemption.

NCLC urged the Georgia Supreme Court to reject the lower court’s application of an unrebuttable “presumption against preemption” wherever there is a “plausible” interpretation disfavoring preemption. NCLC argued that the lower court misread the Supreme Court’s decision in Bates v. Dow Agrosciences, LLC to justify ignoring the legislative history of the National Childhood Vaccine Injury Compensation Act, which shows that Congress intended there to be an “unavoidably unsafe product” defense in all cases involving covered vaccines. NCLC argued that Bates does not require courts to disfavor preemption. NCLC also argued that the Supreme Court’s decision inRiegel v. Medtronic demonstrates that Bates does not require that a federal preemption provision must explicitly refer to common-law claims or duties in order to preempt them.