A US federal judge last night denied a motion for class-action status for personal injury and wrongful death cases involving Merck's withdrawn Vioxx painkiller.
Judge Eldon Fallon of New Orleans, who is overseeing all of the more than 7,000 federal lawsuits involving Vioxx, denied a request by plaintiffs' attorneys for the class-action status.
Class-action status would have given the Vioxx plaintiffs more leverage in their fight against Merck, by allowing attorneys to sue on behalf of all individuals alleging harm.
"In this case, the difficulties in class management overwhelm any efficiencies that could be secured through classwide adjudication," Judge Fallon wrote in his decision.
"Indeed, the predominance of individual issues relating to plaintiffs' claims for compensatory and punitive damages detracts from the superiority of the class action device in resolving these claims."
About 24,000 federal and state lawsuits have been filed by people who claim to have been harmed by the drug, which Merck withdrew in 2004 after it was shown to increase the risk of heart attacks.
Merck has vowed to fight the lawsuits one by one rather than agree to a costly group settlement with the plaintiffs - such as the one struck by Wyeth over its withdrawn "fen-phen" diet drugs.