Johnson & Johnson is ordered to pay $1bn over faulty hip implants

A federal jury in Dallas has ordered Johnson & Johnson to pay $1.041bn (£0.82bn; €0.98bn) in compensation and punitive damages after it found in favour of six plaintiffs who claimed that the company’s DePuy medical devices subsidiary deliberately hid flaws in its Pinnacle metal-on-metal artificial hips from doctors and patients.

All six plaintiffs needed revision surgery to replace the devices and to repair injuries that included tissue death and bone erosion. The Dallas hearing was a test case, the third of seven “bellwether” cases intended to establish liability and to guide compensation in 8900 claims pending from other Pinnacle …