IT HAS been a painfully depressing week for makers of painkillers and antidepressants.
Merck, the drugs giant based in Whitehouse Station, New Jersey, suffered a major setback on 19 August when a Texas jury awarded $253 million to Carol Ernst, who claimed her husband had died after taking the painkiller Vioxx.
However, Merck, which withdrew Vioxx last year, announced it is appealing against the verdict. The company said there is no evidence that Vioxx causes abnormalities in heart rhythm like those which killed Robert Ernst. 鈥淭here are other Vioxx cases coming to trial, and we will vigorously defend them one by one,鈥� said Kenneth Frazier, Merck鈥檚 senior vice-president.
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Meanwhile, GlaxoSmithKline鈥檚 (GSK) top-selling antidepressant Seroxat also took a hammering. Ivar Aursnes and his team at the University of Oslo in Norway concluded that adults taking the drug are more likely to attempt suicide (BMC Medicine, DOI: 10.1186/1741-7015-3-14). Because of this risk, drug regulators in the US and Europe already advise against giving selective serotonin reuptake inhibitors (SSRIs) like Seroxat to those under 18.
Aursnes wants adults alerted too. 鈥淭hey should be warned there鈥檚 a risk,鈥� he says. GSK says the study is misleading because it 鈥渇ocuses on incorrectly selected data collected 15 years ago鈥�.
