Johnson & Johnson has built a health care empire. It includes prescription and over-the-counter drugs, orthopedic implants, surgical products and household products.

The most popular brands include Band-Aids, Tylenol and Johnson’s Baby Powder. Still, more than 90 percent of J&J’s revenue comes from prescription drugs and medical devices.

A Huffington Post investigation called J&J “America’s most admired lawbreaker.”

J&J has been at the center of scandals and government investigations. It has issued recalls of some of its drugs and devices.

Consumers harmed by J&J products are suing the company. They question the company’s motives and say it puts profits over people.

In 2019, it recalled tens of thousands of bottles of its iconic Johnson’s Baby Powder after the FDA found small amounts of asbestos in a sample.

Then in May 2020, the company said it would stop selling talcum-based baby powder in Canada and the United States after state juries ordered the company to pay billions of dollars to people who claimed the product gave them cancer.

The company said it stopped selling the product because of low sales. It still faces more than 20,000 federal talcum powder lawsuits in multidistrict litigation and many more in state courts as of September 2020.

In October 2020, Johnson & Johnson agreed to settle more than 1,000 talcum powder lawsuits for $100 million.

Lawyers in the federal lawsuits expect to prepare for bellwether trials soon but none have been scheduled as of September 2020.

Johnson & Johnson has over 125,000 employees spread across 60 countries. Its main headquarters is in New Brunswick, New Jersey.

J&J brought in more than $76 billion in 2017. It ranked No. 1 in annual revenue among its competitors.

Alex Gorsky is its CEO. He is the seventh CEO to head J&J.

Robert, James and Edward Johnson founded Johnson & Johnson in 1886 in New Brunswick, New Jersey. The company focused on bandages, sterile sutures and wound care.

The company also sold women’s health products. These included sanitary protection products. It also sold maternity kits with first-aid products to make childbirth safer.

J&J created the first commercial dressings applied by consumers. We know this product made in 1921 as Band-Aids.

Johnson & Johnson is a parent company for over 250 subsidiaries. Together, the companies make up “the Johnson & Johnson family of companies.”

Johnson & Johnson products fall into three categories. These include consumer health care products, medical devices and pharmaceutical drugs.

Johnson & Johnson recalled some of its most popular products after patients reported injuries. The FDA and other government agencies investigated.

J&J has faced hundreds of thousands of lawsuits over claims its products are defective.

Lawsuits point to internal documents showing J&J and its subsidiaries knew about problems with their products but sold them anyway.

In addition to individual product liability lawsuits, individual states who say Johnson & Johnson helped fuel the opioid crisis are suing the company for millions of dollars.

The company is facing smaller, emerging litigations for the interstitial cystitis (IC) drug Elmiron and DePuy’s Attune knee implants.

Elmiron litigation is in the beginning stages with a handful of cases filed in state courts, but lawyers expect hundreds more. People who filed lawsuits say Johnson & Johnson’s Janssen Pharmaceuticals unit failed to warn them that the drug could cause vision problems, particularly a condition called pigmentary maculopathy.

DePuy’s Attune knee implant litigation is ongoing, and people who filed lawsuits say the implant loosened and failed leading to pain and revision surgery.

DePuy hip litigation is ongoing, and juries have awarded more than a billion dollars to plaintiffs who say they were injured by faulty Pinnacle hip implants. In February 2019, Bloomberg reported the company may be willing to pay $400 million to settle 3,300 of the claims but was not offering a global settlement.

J&J was involved in seven of 2017’s top ten health-care-related verdicts.

The company was also involved in the third-largest pharmaceutical settlement with the U.S. Department of Justice. In 2013, J&J paid the Justice Department more than $2.2 billion. The settlement resolved civil and criminal allegations involving Risperdal, Invega and Natrecor.