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$9 Million Vioxx Award ATLANTIC CITY, N.J. (AP) - April 11, 2006 - A jury has awarded $9 million in punitive damages to a man who blamed his heart attack on Vioxx. The man claimed the painkiller caused his heart attack. The same panel awarded the man $4.5 million compensatory damages last week. The panel said the company concealed the risks of the drug. It was decided that John McDarby, 77, a retired insurance agent from Park Ridge, should receive compensation. The verdict came after less than two days of deliberations by a six-woman, two-man jury. The trial was the first dealing with plaintiffs who blamed illnesses on long-term use of the painkiller. McDarby, a diabetic who took Vioxx for four years, suffered his heart attack in his living room and broke his hip as a result, triggering a sudden slide that has left him using a wheelchair and unable to care for himself, according to his lawyers. In its only other loss in a Vioxx case, Merck was ordered last August to pay $253 million to the widow of a man who died after taking the drug for a short time. That amount will be reduced because the law in Texas, where the case was heard, limits punitive damages.
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