Comments on: Merck and the Vioxx Decision

By: Anderson

Anderson — Wed, 24 Aug 2005 18:18:27 +0000

Does anyone think this verdict has a prayer's chance in hell of surviving the Texas appellate courts?

By: M1EK

M1EK — Wed, 24 Aug 2005 18:10:15 +0000

No, they vented their anger at Merck because the lawyers did a good job of proving that Merck lied and covered up dangers of the drug, EVEN THOUGH it doesn't appear that said dangers had anything to do with THIS man's death. It's still wrong, but it's a bit more defensible than Herb's explanation.

By: Ragout

Ragout — Wed, 24 Aug 2005 07:01:06 +0000

The Evidence Against Vioxx Blogging UCSD economist James Hamilton waded into epidemiology yesterday but appears to have been dragged under by the libertarian Reason magazine. Hamilton devotes most of his post to arguing that "studies suggest but can't prove" that Vioxx causes...

By: Herb

Herb — Wed, 24 Aug 2005 01:34:08 +0000

I can't say that the Texas jury was right or wrong, I think the jury, made up of ordinary citizens, vented their anger at Merck because it was a way for them to express their disgust at the drug companies for the high price of drugs. What it says to other companies is, If you rip me off, then you will someday end up paying the price. If you really think about it, it's about the only way the ordinary average citizen can do something about it.

By: jason

jason — Wed, 24 Aug 2005 00:15:21 +0000

The main question you have to ask yourself is if Merck management knew about the risks of vioxx and decided unilaterally that it was acceptable and that the public and FDA didn't need to know because it was so small. Recent email and Merck documents discovered by Reuters that as soon as 1998 Merck was trying to reformulate vioxx for cardiovascular risk. Also email documents showed that head scientists at Merck were worried and warned Merck management about the cardiovascular risks of vioxx. Your right that people are willing to accept medicines that aren't 100% safe but people deserve to know all of the risks. Management cant unilaterally decide by themselves that the risks are so small, they don't need to tell anybody. Thats the problem, that Merck unilaterally decide to keep the cardiovascular problems a secret, till it was too late and proved Tobe Little bit more then a small problem.

By: cirby

cirby — Tue, 23 Aug 2005 23:59:55 +0000

I saw a lot of the presentations during the clinical trials of Vioxx (I ran the AV gear for many of the meetings, and prepped or edited a lot of the slides), and there was *no* indication of any serious cardiac side effects in any of the major clinical trials. They were looking for some, and it just didn't show up in the stats in the official trials.

Some of the doctors involved have mentioned that they *think* that any cardiac side effects *might* be a drug or food interaction issue, but it would cost a couple of billion more to figure out what it might be, and it's not worth the cost...