(Bloomberg) -- Sanofi SA and Pfizer Inc. have agreed to settle a California man’s lawsuit over Zantac in the first case set for trial on claims the heartburn drug can cause cancer.

Sanofi confirmed the deal Wednesday in a statement, without saying what it had agreed to pay James Goetz to resolve his allegations that Zantac led to his bladder cancer. 

“Sanofi settled this case not because it believes these claims have any merit, but rather to avoid the expense and distraction of a trial in California,” the Paris-based company said.

A Pfizer spokesman said the drugmaker had agreed to resolve its own part of the case and had no further comment.

The settlements come after a federal judge in Florida threw out more than 5,000 similar suits this month, saying the scientific evidence behind the Zantac cancer claims was flawed. The ruling by US District Judge Robin Rosenberg also covers about 50,000 unfiled cases that were gathered before her for pretrial information exchanges. 

50,000 Lawsuits

That still leaves more than 50,000 suits in state courts that plaintiffs’ lawyers say they have filed, alleging drugmakers knew Zantac’s active ingredient, ranitidine, degraded and turned into the potential carcinogen NDMA under certain conditions.

A spokesperson for GSK Plc, which Goetz also sued, said the company would fight all Zantac cases filed in state courts, including in Pennsylvania, New York, California and Delaware. Boehringer Ingelheim said it, too, would continue to defend itself against any allegations that Zantac causes cancer, given the scientific evidence and the federal court ruling. 

Brent Wisner, Goetz’s lawyer, didn’t return an email seeking comment on the status of the case.

The jury is scheduled to start hearing evidence in February in Oakland.

Battered Shares

The California settlements came to light after Barclays Plc analyst Iain Simpson said in a note to investors that lawyers had discussed Sanofi’s deal in a Dec. 20 court hearing. 

“Our view is that this further removes the Zantac overhang for Sanofi (at least in the near term),” Simpson said in the note.

Sanofi’s, Pfizer’s and GSK’s shares took a beating this summer when Morgan Stanley analyst Mark Purcell estimated drugmakers’ total damages from the litigation could reach $45 billion. Other analysts, including Bloomberg Intelligence’s Holly Froum, said the companies face a much lower risk but still as much as $6 billion in damages.

The stocks recovered this month after Rosenberg concluded that consumers had relied on flawed science to back up their federal suits blaming Zantac for their cancers. Plaintiffs’ lawyers plan to appeal the ruling.

Series of Owners

In 2020 the US Food and Drug Administration asked companies to remove all ranitidine-based drugs from the US market after some versions were found to be contaminated with NDMA. The product is back on the market but no longer contains ranitidine. 

Zantac, which was developed by GSK and Warner-Lambert, hit the US market as a prescription drug in 1983 before becoming an over-the-counter heartburn treatment in 1995. It was owned by several companies through the years before Sanofi acquired it in 2017.

The California case is James Goetz v. GlaxoSmithKline, No. RG20061705, California Superior Court for Alameda County (Oakland).

--With assistance from Bre Bradham and Malathi Nayak.

(Updates with Pfizer news as well as details and context throughout.)

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