Mistrial declared in Vioxx lawsuit

A JUDGE declared a mistrial yesterday in the first federal lawsuit over the once-popular painkiller Vioxx after jurors were unable to reach a unanimous verdict.

Merck & Co emerged from its third Vioxx trial yesterday with a hung jury when the panel failed, in about 18 hours of deliberations over three days, to side with the drugmaker or with the wife of a 53-year-old Florida man who died after taking Vioxx for about a month.

The mistrial means Merck, which already had a one and one record in Vioxx litigation, was unable to gain any momentum in its battle against thousands of other expected lawsuits related to the drug, which was withdrawn from the market last year after being linked to cardiovascular problems.

The jury couldn’t decide whether Merck was liable in Richard “Dicky” Irvin’s 2001 death and whether the company failed to issue safety warnings that the drug could have serious cardiovascular side effects.

US District Judge Eldon Fallon said he would confer with attorneys next week to set a retrial date.