--- title: Women Sue Birth Control Company Over Unwanted Pregnancies description: More than 100 women are suing a maker of birth control pills, alleging that incorrect packaging of the pills led to unwanted pregnancy. canonical: https://time.com/4110251/birth-control-pill-qualitest-lawsuit/ author: Tessa Berenson article:opinion: false article:content_tier: free article:published_time: 2015-11-12T17:15:12.000Z article:modified_time: 2026-02-22T12:34:12.447Z article:section: Health og:title: Women Sue Birth Control Company Over Unwanted Pregnancies og:description: They say the birth control pills were incorrectly packaged og:url: https://time.com/4110251/birth-control-pill-qualitest-lawsuit/ og:site_name: TIME og:image: https://static.time.com/v3/assets/bltea6093859af6183b/bltde093bcdab65f2d0/6988d9b9bc6cfc69913e2a3c/time-logo.jpg?branch=production og:image:width: 1200 og:image:height: 675 og:image:alt: TIME og:type: article twitter:card: summary_large_image twitter:title: Women Sue Birth Control Company Over Unwanted Pregnancies twitter:description: They say the birth control pills were incorrectly packaged twitter:image: https://static.time.com/v3/assets/bltea6093859af6183b/bltde093bcdab65f2d0/6988d9b9bc6cfc69913e2a3c/time-logo.jpg?branch=production --- # Women Sue Birth Control Company Over Unwanted Pregnancies > Sponsored content. 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Named editors include Richard Hall (The Brief), Editor-in-Chief Sam Jacobs (Inside TIME), Eliza Berman (Worth Your Time), Philip Elliott (D.C. Brief), Justin Worland (Future Proof) and Harry Booth (In the Loop). Health Matters is written by TIME's health desk. #### How do I sign up for a TIME newsletter? Go to time.com/newsletters, choose the newsletters you want and enter your email address. There is no cost and no subscription requirement. ### Sources * TIME Newsletters: [time.com/newsletters](/c/time-nl-network-2026q3/newsletters?i=bdaaf302-1c53-40a8-bcee-a754974c5a2f&cr=time-nl-network-2026q3-v1)  by [Tessa Berenson](https://time.com/author/tessa-berenson/)  ## Tessa Berenson Nov 12, 2015 5:15 PM UTC  by [Tessa Berenson](https://time.com/author/tessa-berenson/)  ## Tessa Berenson Nov 12, 2015 5:15 PM UTC More than 100 women are suing a maker of birth control pills, alleging that incorrect packaging of the pills led to unwanted pregnancy. One hundred and thirteen women from 28 states who became pregnant are suing Qualitest Pharmaceuticals for millions in damages, [ABC reports](http://abcnews.go.com/Health/lawsuit-alleges-birth-control-packing-error-led-unwanted/story?id=35140742), saying that the pills were misplaced in the packages so the women took the placebo pills at the wrong time. Qualitest [recalled 1.4 million packages](http://healthland.time.com/2011/09/19/birth-control-pills-recalled-for-packaging-error/) of birth control pills for a packaging error in 2011. Placebo pills are meant to be taken the week of menstruation, but the lawsuit says the pills in the packet were “rotated 180 degrees … reversing the weekly tablet orientation,” which left the women “without adequate contraception.” In a statement to ABC, Endo Pharmaceuticals, of which Qualitest is a subsidiary, said, “Our commitment is to patient safety and we take product quality very seriously. … There is no new or recent product recall. The recall that forms the basis of this suit was entirely voluntary and occurred more than four years ago in September 2011\. The voluntary recall occurred based on an extremely small number of pill packs that were manufactured by an external contract manufacturer. Endo has been able to confirm only one blister pack that manifested a defect and was sold to a patient. Additionally, courts have dismissed cases arising out of the recall because the plaintiff could not establish that she purchased a defective package.” ```json [{"@context":"https://schema.org","@type":"NewsArticle","@id":"https://time.com/4110251/birth-control-pill-qualitest-lawsuit/","mainEntityOfPage":{"@type":"WebPage","@id":"https://time.com/4110251/birth-control-pill-qualitest-lawsuit/"},"headline":"Women Sue Birth Control Company Over Unwanted Pregnancies","datePublished":"2015-11-12T17:15:12.000Z","dateModified":"2026-02-22T12:34:12.447Z","description":"They say the birth control pills were incorrectly packaged","url":"https://time.com/4110251/birth-control-pill-qualitest-lawsuit/","keywords":["Sex/Relationships","Pregnancy","Birth Control"],"thumbnailUrl":"","author":[{"@type":"Person","name":"Tessa Berenson","jobTitle":null,"url":"https://time.com/author/tessa-berenson/"}],"articleSection":"Health","image":[],"publisher":{"@type":"Organization","name":"Time","url":"https://time.com/","logo":{"@type":"ImageObject","url":"https://time.com/images/logo.png","width":528,"height":156},"foundingDate":"March 3, 1923","sameAs":["https://www.facebook.com/time","https://www.instagram.com/time/?hl=en","https://twitter.com/time","https://www.pinterest.com/timemagazine"]}},{"@context":"https://schema.org","@type":"BreadcrumbList","itemListElement":[{"@type":"ListItem","position":1,"item":{"@id":"https://time.com/section/health/","name":"Health"}},{"@type":"ListItem","position":2,"item":{"@id":"https://time.com/tag/sexrelationships/","name":"Sex/Relationships"}},{"@type":"ListItem","position":3,"item":{"@id":"https://time.com/4110251/birth-control-pill-qualitest-lawsuit/","name":"Women Sue Birth Control Company Over Unwanted Pregnancies"}}]}] ```