Merck had previously said that it planned to defend itself in every personal-injury lawsuit filed over Vioxx, a painkiller and arthritis medicine that has been shown to raise the risk of heart attacks and strokes.

But Frazier said in an interview Thursday that Merck would consider settling suits brought by people who took Vioxx for long periods of time and had few other risk factors for heart disease.

Nearly 5,000 Vioxx suits have already been filed, and tens of thousands more are expected.

Sensitive Issue for Merck

Frazier's comments appear to represent a subtle but important shift in strategy for Merck, although he denied that the company had changed its position.

The issue of possible settlements is extraordinarily sensitive for Merck because of the prospect that plaintiffs' lawyers might file many additional lawsuits if they believe that Merck is willing to settle any of them.

But taking every case to trial also has risks, as Merck saw last week when the first Vioxx case reached trial. A Texas jury found Merck liable for the death of Robert Ernst, who died in May 2001 after taking Vioxx, and said that his widow, Carol Ernst, should be awarded $253.5 million. The award was among the highest ever given to an individual plaintiff, although Texas law will automatically reduce it to about $26 million and Merck has said it will appeal.

Risk of Heart Attacks, Strokes

In response to a question as to whether Merck would settle cases, Frazier said: "We would look at the facts of the case and make reasonable decisions."

He added that "the point is that each one of these cases raises individual sets of facts." Cases where settlements might be possible represent only a small fraction of all the lawsuits filed against Merck, Frazier said.

Merck does not plan to offer plaintiffs' lawyers an overall settlement of all the Vioxx suits, Frazier said. "We have no interest into entering into any kind of broad global settlement," he said.

W. Mark Lanier, the lawyer who represented Carol Ernst, said Thursday that Merck's willingness to consider settling some cases marked an important first step in undoing the damage that Vioxx had caused.

Merck stopped selling Vioxx in September 2004 after a clinical trial showed that patients taking the drug for more than 18 months had a substantially higher risk of heart attacks and strokes than people taking a placebo.

Other trials have shown that Vioxx raises heart risks over a shorter period of time compared to a placebo or to naproxen, an older painkiller.

More Than 50,000 Lawsuits

The next Vioxx suit scheduled for trial is a New Jersey state court case, expected to be heard next month, involving a man who survived a heart attack after taking the drug for a short time.

On Thursday Merck's lawyers asked the judge in that case to postpone the trial, citing the publicity over last week's verdict in Texas.

And in New Orleans on Thursday, a federal judge set trial schedules for four Vioxx cases, including one in November and three others in early 2006.

The judge, Eldon Fallon, is overseeing 1,800 Vioxx lawsuits already filed in federal courts around the country. The four scheduled cases are to cover several different kinds of plaintiffs, including people who took Vioxx for a long period of time and those who took the drug for only a few weeks or months, Fallon said.

Better Chance in Federal Courts?

Merck has pressed to have the federal cases tried quickly because it believes it has a better chance of success in federal court than in state courts. Federal courts usually have stricter rules on what evidence can be presented than state courts, and federal judges typically have less patience for the aggressive tactics sometimes used by plaintiffs' lawyers.

Merck said at a hearing before Fallon in New Orleans on Thursday that as of Aug. 15, it faced 4,951 lawsuits from people who claim that they suffered heart damage after taking the drug, or from the families of people who died after taking it.

The total number of cases has risen by about 650 since July, and has probably jumped again since the Texas jury returned its verdict on Friday. Lawyers and Wall Street analysts say that Merck could eventually face more than 50,000 lawsuits. Lanier said his firm alone represented nearly 2,000 plaintiffs.

Jurors Criticized Merck Lawyers

Frazier repeated on Thursday Merck's vow to appeal the verdict in the Texas case, saying that Judge Ben Hardin had allowed jurors to hear irrelevant and misleading testimony.

Merck has not decided whether to continue using the two law firms that represented it in the Texas case, Fulbright & Jaworski and Williams & Connolly, Frazier said. In interviews after the case, several jurors sharply criticized Merck's lawyers as patronizing, and some of Merck's witnesses appeared to be ill-prepared for Lanier's questions.

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