London, EnglandThe UK's largest drugmaker, GlaxoSmithKline, recently said that it will incur legal costs of $3.5 billion in the fourth quarter due to liability cases associated with its diabetes drug Avandia, Bloomberg reports.
In a statement, the drug company said that the legal costs will help cover for the "substantial" number of claims that have been filed recently in the US related to Avandia.
"I am a bit surprised to see such a high charge come in," Navid Malik, an analyst with Matrix Corporate Capital in London, told the news provider. "I thought there was going to be an additional charge, but I didn't think it was going to be this high."
On September 23, the company announced that it would cease the promotion of Avandia across the globe after regulators indicated that sales in the US would be regulated and that the treatment would be taken off the European market, according to the news source. The drug, which was once the top-selling diabetes treatment in the world, has reportedly been linked to an increase in heart attacks.
According to the National Center for Biotechnology Information, other Avandia side effects can include headache, back pain and loss of appetite.
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