County Suing Merck For Medicaid Fraud
Erie County has filed a lawsuit against Merck & Co., the maker of the prescription drug, Vioxx, alleging the pharmaceutical maker defrauded the Medicaid program of an estimated $6 million dollars.
In papers filed in New Jersey, where Merck (NYSE: MRK) is based, attorneys for Erie County say the company engaged for many years in an aggressive and fraudulent marketing campaign to the medical profession and consumers designed to minimize the dangers of Vioxx, and convince physicians to write prescriptions for the drug that they would not have written had they known the truth.
The county said in a news release that Vioxx was sold as a painkiller for treating arthritis, headaches and other conditions, and was many times more expensive than over-the-counter pain relievers like Naproxen (Alleve) and Advil. The complaint said Merck had evidence of cardiovascular risks associated with Vioxx before it ever sold the drug to the public. The county refers to a study, sponsored by Merck, that showed patients who took Vioxx had five times the risk of having a heart attack, compared with those taking Naproxen.
Despite the results of this study, Merck failed to warn of these adverse consequences and continued to conceal or minimize the dangers of Vioxx in order to promote sales.
Merck withdrew Vioxx from the market in September 2004.
New York state, along with at least six other states, has filed similar actions against Merck. The company has defended its actions, saying it carefully studied Vioxx before and after receiving U.S. Food and Drug Adminstration (FDA) approval, and consistently made the results of those studies available to the FDA and the medical and scientific communities.