Vioxx

Different groups of people who have suffered the effects of Vioxx are claiming their right to file a class action lawsuit against Merck & Co., the pharmaceutical company behind the drug classified as a nonsteroidal anti-inflammatory drugs (NSAIDs), serving as a Cox-2 inhibitor for acute pain relief, which presumable also prevented cancer by means of blocking the growth of new blood vessels in tumors.

However, safety concerns in the US market, led Merck to voluntarily withdraw from the market its medication since 2004. The active ingredient in Vioxx was Rofecoxib, a nonsteroidal anti-inflammatory drug (NSAID) used for the treatment of osteoarthritis and rheumatoid arthritis. Merck used Rofecoxib in 3 of its products: Vioxx, Ceeoxx, and Ceoxx.

Claiming to be a global research-driven pharmaceutical company, Merck demonstrated that it is genuinely dedicated to putting patients first, when they announced the voluntarily withdrawal of Vioxx from the worldwide markets, not limited to the United States. After the withdrawal of Vioxx, science has continued evolving and finding new data.

Merck is distributing as much information as possible in its Resource Center, aimed to help people injured by Vioxx. Patients prescribed with Vioxx had twice as much risk of stroke or heart attack since the introduction of this medication in 1999. Upwards of 20 million Americans have taken Vioxx during its marketing cycle.

When a clinical trial revealed that patients taking Vioxx had a 100% greater chance of any sort of severe coronary injury, including sudden death, Merck announced that its commitment to scientific excellence, making patient safety its top priority, led to the decision that discontinued the manufacturing and prescription of VIOXX.

Despite their efforts for minimize the harm, Vioxx litigation continues under fierce scrutiny from consumers, lawyers, pharmaceutical companies, and diverse corporate officials. Numbers reveal over 4,200 state and federal lawsuits are pending across the United States due to Vioxx-related issues that have no follow up through Merck's website.

"Merck does not intend to address specific cases or comment about ongoing litigation on this site", that is the way in which Merck resumes its position about the ongoing fights. "As a Company, we continue to believe that we acted responsibly". In fact, Merck researched prior FDA approval, monitor the drug after it, and declared the voluntarily withdrawing when adverse results were increasing.

As of September 2005, Merck was also refunding the money for unused Vioxx tablets and patient kits, encouraging people for whom the medication worked to share their experiences by writing to the Food and Drug Administration. However, you can find up-to-date litigation information at the pharmaceutical's information center, located at this address: http://www.merck.com/newsroom/vioxx/.

According to studies, complications of taking Vioxx began around 18 months after the patient was prescribed with this medication, typically increasing the risk of blood clots, resulting of cardiovascular events, such as chest pain related to heart disease, stroke, heart attack, and sudden death.

Those people who believed they could be victims of Vioxx, may get a free case evaluation, to find if they are entitled to compensation due to injuries suffered from the prescription of Vioxx.