Merck & Co. Offers to Settle Vioxx Lawsuits

US pharmaceutical giant, Merck & Co. is considering settling some lawsuits over its scandal hit painkiller Vioxx.

The firm was recently told to pay out $253 million after a jury in Texas found the drug had contributed to a man’s death and that the firm had been negligent.

Merck withdrew Vioxx last year after its own study said it could double the risk of heart attack or stroke.

The company has previously said it would fight all personal-injury litigation over the drug’s harmful side effects.

"Certainly we will make reasonable decisions about how to proceed in defending each one of those cases," spokesman Kent Jarrell told The Associated Press, adding that Merck has "no intention of entering into any kind of global settlement."

Merck’s general counsel, Kenneth C. Frazier, told The New York Times in Friday’s editions that Merck would consider settling suits brought by people who took Vioxx for long periods of time and had few other risk factors for heart disease.

Jarrell said the company did not know how many patients took Vioxx for at least 18 months and also had low risks of heart problems but expected it to be "a relatively small number". The combination of those circumstances would strengthen the patients’ cases.

There are 4200 Vioxx-related lawsuits pending across the US and lawsuits have also been filed in Canada, Europe, Brazil, Australia and Israel.

Vioxx is known to have been taken by more than 20m people in more than 80 countries worldwide before it was withdrawn.

It has been estimated that the drug could have caused 27,785 heart attacks or deaths since it was approved for use in 1999.