The Suit Against Vioxx
The Vioxx scandal has altered the health care community forever! Vioxx was one of the most prescribed drugs for arthritis pain, before it was removed the market. It was removed from this market when research samples proved it raised the chance of cardiac arrest in people taking it. Even though the drug has been pulled off the marketplace for a while, legal action against the manufacturer Merck continued and has increased for sometime now. Vioxx suit has become a more house hold term after a judge awarded $253.4 million to Carol Ernst, widow of Bob Ernst due to his death in May 2001 from the drug. This was the most money ever given to an individual for this type of case. He had used Vioxx daily. This historic judgement prompted more and more personal injury attorneys to take cases that client claimed to be harmed by the medicine they had been taking. In one afternoon Merck stock drop eight points and lost the confidence of the nation.
Through the 1998 clinical trials for Vioxx, Merck the manufacturer reported to FDA that there was no apparent cardiovascular signals. What this means is that nothing hinted that the drug caused issues with the heart. At the same time that the clinical trials were taking place Merck had been conducting an internal trial that revealed major cardiovascular problems with users of Vioxx. Study – 090 was what they hid their results under. Merck claimed they had not published the findings because the testing group had not been big enough.
FDA gave formal approval in 1999, Vioxx was the 2nd nonsteroidal anti-inflammatory medication or COX-2 inhibitor approved after its predecessor Celebrex. Celebrex was another health condition causing drug.
Vioxx was expected to compensate the shortfall of falling sales from Merck’s other drugs, but sales were slowed down by concerns among doctors that its use could form thrombus that may cause cardiac arrest. Merck tried to regain the confidence of doctors by including on the label that the drug may cause heart related illnesses. They also said that had a ongoing study that was collecting more data about the cardiovascular results of using Vioxx. Merck then promoted the new Vioxx aggressively into international market and by 2003 it was available in 80 countries with sales above $2.5 billion. The tests Merck had been doing revealed that Vioxx had deadly results.
The FDA, in 2001, mandated that all bottle have warning issues that explain the adverse reactions. Merck was reprimanded for the incorrect information about the side effects of Vioxx they had provided for the medical community.
Problems started surfacing soon and they served the warnings to FDA, the industry critics, and to personal injury attorneys who soon began to gather evidence. This evidence gathering resulted in Merck’s negligence to recalled the drug. Massive marketing campaigns in all forms of media requested patients that had been harmed by Vioxx to come forward. It help inform everyone and find the those that had been effected from it.
The last nail in the coffin was Merck’s announcement in September 2004, withdrawing Vioxx. This added hard evidence for the law suit which had already commenced. The was the birth of the Vioxx lawsuit. There were cases that had been filed in 2005. Ernst’s case was the first to be settled. That was the first case of many for Merck. Because of the ruling on Ernst’s case Vioxx could have wrongful death cases that would ruin Merck financially.
In August of 2005 there were 4,951 cases filed and thousands more were expected. Seeing that the number of Vioxx lawsuits is increasing by the day, Merck may consider offering settlements to plaintiffs in some cases. Merck had previously planned to defend itself in every personal-injury Vioxx lawsuit. This would mark a first step by Merck in undoing the damage Vioxx has caused. Attorneys projected that at least 25,000 cases had been filed. About 20 million people used Vioxx between May 1999 and September 2004, when Merck stopped selling the drug after a clinical trial showed that Vioxx caused heart attacks and strokes in patients taking it for at least 18 months.
We can expect the Vioxx lawsuit to rule the medical and legal news for some time to come, and it has the potential to be the biggest personal injury lawsuit in history of mankind.
Byrone Glitterstym is an author with special knowledge about lemon law california He stays up to date on new trends in the industry.
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