Series of 3 Paragard Lawsuits Set for Trial To Begin Jan. 2026 Through May 2026

The U.S. District Judge presiding over all Paragard IUD lawsuits filed throughout the federal court system has announced that the first bellwether trials over claims of injuries caused by the birth control implant will go before a jury early next year.

The Paragard IUD is a small plastic device wrapped in copper, which is placed in the uterus to provide women long-acting protection against pregnancy for up to 10 years.

Although the device is marketed as a safe and reversible form of contraception, allowing doctors to remove the IUD during an out-patient office procedure when patients no longer want the birth control, a number of women have been left with painful and debilitating injuries when a Paragard IUD fractured during attempts to remove it, often resulting in the need for emergency surgery to retrieve pieces of the broken IUD.

As a result of the manufacturer’s failure to adequately disclose these risks, nearly 3,000 product liability lawsuits are currently being pursued throughout the federal court system, each raising similar allegations that the Paragard IUD was defectively designed and unreasonably dangerous.

Given common questions of fact and law raised in complaints filed in U.S. District Courts nationwide, consolidated pretrial proceedings were established as part of an MDL (multidistrict litigation) in the U.S. District Court for the Northern District of Georgia, for coordinated discovery and pretrial proceedings before Judge Leigh Martin May.

As part of the coordinated MDL proceedings, Judge May has established a bellwether program, where a small group of representative cases are being prepared for early trial dates to help the parties gauge how juries are likely to react to certain evidence and expert witness testimony that will be repeated throughout thousands of cases if Paragard settlements are not reached.

However, the start of these early Paragard IUD trials has been delayed multiple times throughout the litigation, with the bellwether trials originally expected to begin early this year.

In a case management order (PDF) issued on February 11, Judge May established a new scheduling order, indicating that the first Paragard IUD bellwether trial is now scheduled to begin on January 12, 2026, with a second trial set to start on March 3, 2026, and a third trial scheduled to begin on May 11, 2026.

The schedule includes various deadlines the parties must now meet to get the cases ready for trial, with the selection of specific cases that will go before juries on each of those trial dates scheduled for April 15, 2025. The parties must complete all expert discovery for the selected trial cases scheduled by August 15, and any Daubert motions challenging the admissibility of expert testimony are due by September 5.

The updated trial schedule comes after Judge May issued a court order (PDF) on February 7, which dismissed about 100 claims brought in New York, Michigan, Idaho, Mississippi, Virginia, Tennessee and Texas, after finding that those specific claims were filed beyond the applicable statute of limitations in each state. However, Judge May refused to throw out about another 100 cases identified by the manufacturers, which were filed in Georgia, Illinois, Iowa and North Carolina, and cleared to move forward.

Judge May indicated the rulings were dependent on each state’s statute of limitations or statute of repose laws, which set time limits on filing a civil lawsuit based on when the plaintiff knew, or should have known, that a particular product was the cause of their injuries. These laws vary from state to state.

Even after the dismissals, the manufacturers continue to face thousands of Paragard IUD lawsuits, each involving allegations and claims similar to those that will be presented to juries early next year.

Although the outcome of the Paragard bellwether trials will not have any binding impact on these other claimants, the cases are expected to have a large impact on any negotiations for a potential global Paragard IUD settlement that would avoid the need for each individual case to be remanded back to U.S. District Courts nationwide for individual trial dates in the coming years.