Class Action Filed Over Meridia Withdrawal

Litigation over the recent Meridia recall has already begun in earnest, with a prominent Canadian law firm announcing that it has filed a nationwide class action seeking "financial compensation for anyone in Canada who used Meridia."

"Our Statement of Claim asserts that one of Canada's most commonly prescribed anti-obesity drugs substantially increases a person's risk of a heart attack," said Tony Merchant, the firm's lead attorney, in a statement released last week.

"Merchant Law Group has already been contacted by former Meridia users from Québec, Ontario, and Alberta, many of whom have suffered serious side effects as a result of using Meridia. Our firm has launched nationwide class action litigation with the courts as a result."

A lawsuit was nearly inevitable after Meridia was pulled from the market on October 8 after a clinical trial published in the New England Journal of Medicine showed that it increases users' risk of suffering a heart attack or stroke. The study, which was funded by Meridia manufacturer Abbott Labs, prompted the Journal to write in an editorial that the drug should be pulled off the market.

In withdrawing the drug, the FDA said that Meridia's risks did not justify "the very modest weight loss that people achieve on this drug" -- an average of just five pounds per patient.

A long time coming

Indeed, national consumer advocacy group Public Citizen has been warning since 2002 that Meridia needs to be withdrawn from the market, citing clinical trials from before the drug was approved showing that obese patients taking the drug experienced increased blood pressure, pulse rate and palpatations.

"If the FDA truly intends to operate as a public health agency, then it should acknowledge that the continued approval of this drug cannot be justified based on science," said Dr. Sidney Wolfe, director of Public Citizen's Health Research Group said last year. "The FDA should therefore tell Abbott to pull Meridia from the market immediately."

Meridia was approved by the FDA in 1997 despite clinical trials showing that patients taking the drug were three times as likely to experience electrocardiogram changes as patients on a placebo regimen. The drug was approved in Canada in December 2000. As of March 2003, the FDA had already received reports of 49 cardiovascular deaths in patients taking Meridia, 27 of them in patients under age 50.

Last Wednesday, the Canadian government announced that it was also withdrawing Meridia's generic equivalent -- Apo-sibutramine -- from the market.

Consumers who believe they qualify to participate in the Canadian class action can visit the firm's webpage dedicated to the litigation. The site says that U.S. residents who have been injured by Meridia can email the firm, which will "contact you promptly concerning options available in the United States to seek financial compensation."