Widow 'encouraged' by Vioxx case

Alec Watt had taken Vioxx for up to nine months before he died

A south Wales widow who alleges the painkiller Vioxx killed her husband has welcomed the £141m awarded by a US jury to an American woman.

Maureen Watt, from Bargoed, is one of hundreds in the UK hoping to take legal action against the US firm Merck.

Mrs Watt, 58, claims the drug induced the heart attack which killed her husband, Alec, almost five years ago.

But Merck is to appeal against a US jury's £141m award to Texan Carol Ernst whose late husband Robert took Vioxx.

Vioxx was withdrawn last year after a study concluded it could double the risk of a heart attack or stroke. Almost 500,000 Britons have used the drug.

But Merck has said there was no scientific base for the Texas ruling in the case of 59-year-old Robert Ernst, and has said it will appeal.

Mrs Watt's solicitor has said that bringing the company to the UK courts would be "near impossible".

Mark Harvey, from Hugh James Solicitors in south Wales, said he was currently filing around 100 cases to the New Jersey courts.

Mrs Watt said she had been encouraged by the Texas ruling

Mrs Watt, who lives in Caerphilly borough, is one of the Wales-based litigants. She said her husband had been taking Vioxx for six-to-nine months to relieve his arthritis.

She said he had a heart attack which left him critically ill for three weeks before he died.

She claimed medics had told her Mr Watt was not a "classic case" for a fatal heart attack, and she blames Vioxx, which had eased her husband's arthritis pains.

She said: "Up until he took the Vioxx, he was alright, he was active. But, all of a sudden, he lost his appetite and he was a very good eater.

'Justice'

"And then he would complain of the cold. He got very irritable and he would sort of snap, when he was a very easy-going person."

Mrs Watt said she was "encouraged" by the verdict of the Texas court, even though Merck has insisted its drug was not to blame for Mr Ernst's death.

The company said Mr Ernst had suffered from an irregular heartbeat and clogged arteries and it was these factors which led to his death. Meanwhile in Bargoed Mrs Watt said: "All I really want, and this has been from the word go, ever since I found out about it, I just wanted justice - for them to admit that that drug was no good and it did cause the problems that they say it caused."