Originally published July 27 2005
Medical ethics committee suing Vioxx makers over animal testing
by Mike Adams, the Health Ranger, NaturalNews Editor
The Newstandard reports that the Physicians Committee for Responsible Medicine (PCRM)'s decision to sue Vioxx manufacturer Merck over use of animal testing to allegedly bolster faulty claims that a drug was safe and effective could be the first case of its kind.
In what may be the first suit of its kind, a physicians' organization is suing a pharmaceutical company for using animal testing allegedly to bolster faulty claims that a drug was safe and effective.
At a press conference in Washington, DC yesterday, the Physicians Committee for Responsible Medicine (PCRM) announced that it had filed a lawsuit Tuesday against drug giant Merck on behalf of Nancy Tufford, a Minnesota woman who says she suffered from heart failure as a result of using the painkiller Vioxx.
PCRM is an advocacy organization that promotes a vegetarian lifestyle.
The group is adamantly opposed to animal testing.
Merk pulled the drug off the market last September in the face of mounting concerns over links to increases in cardiac arrest and stroke in long-term users.
In the court filing, PCRM alleges that Merck used data from animal studies demonstrating that Vioxx is beneficial despite knowing that such tests often fail to correlate with human results.
A company statement refuted the charges and noted that Vioxx testing relied on "multiple sources involving extensive human trials," in addition to the animal studies, Reuters reports.
According to a study authored by Dr. John J. Pippin, a PCRM consultant, and delivered to the Food and Drug Administration in February, the effects of the drug on animals and humans are disparate enough to warrant negation of FDA approval.
Yesterday's suit was filed in New Jersey Superior Court and seeks $1 million in damages.
It joins about 3,800 other individual and 118 class action lawsuits against the company over Vioxx.
Merck has said it intends to fight every suit.
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