Merck - Vioxx - marketing department in court

The first federal Vioxx retrial has revealed a different strategy from the plaintiffs: "go for the marketeers rather than the medics".

This time, the first three witnesses all worked in Merck's marketing or public relations department. On Tuesday, off-camera attorneys questioned J. Martin Carroll, who was executive vice president of marketing in 2001, and Jan Weiner, executive director of public affairs, about why information about heart attacks wasn't part of marketing or press materials.

This follows on from the questioning of Susan L Baumgartner ; she of the "bad guys list".

"It's not a change of tactics," just a matter of bringing in evidence which became available after the first trial, said Russ Herman, head of the federal plaintiffs' steering committee and spokesman in this trial.

In rebuttal testimony played for the jury Tuesday, Dr Baumgartner said she got a pharmacology doctorate to follow her father's footsteps, and worked for Merck because it embodied her values of putting patients first.

Merck did not put on any rebuttal video for Carroll or Weiner. It didn't need to because the witnesses were clear, spokesman Kent Jarrell said.

"This case is all about causation. That is the most important part of the case," he said.

"Marketing doesn't go to the point because the prescribing doctor never reviewed the literature and never met with marketing representatives" from Merck.

Carroll, who now is president and chief operating officer of Boehringer Ingelheim Pharmaceuticals Inc., of Ridgefield, Conn., was shown several Merck studies in which patients taking Vioxx had more heart attacks and other cardiovascular problems than those given another drug or sugar pills. He said he hadn't seen them before.

They were written while Carroll was at Merck, and its sales representatives had information cards saying Vioxx was about as safe for the heart as a sugar pill.

"This says the trend is against Vioxx. Not similar. Right?" an off-camera attorney asked.

"That's what it says," Carroll answered.

A bit later, the attorney asked, "Did you share this information with doctors?"

That wasn't information for salespeople -- they have to stick to what's on the label and packaging insert, Carroll said. Doctors have plenty of other information sources, such as medical conferences, meetings and publications, he said.

Insiders' view: Some of the hardest sins to prove are those of omission.

Source: Yahoo