U.S. drugs giant Merck & Co Inc. should have pulled its Vioxx painkiller from the market four years ago because data showing it raised the risk of heart attacks has existed since 2000, Swiss scientists said on Friday. In a report for British medical journal The Lancet, researchers at the University of Berne said there was substantial evidence of the dangerous side effects of the drug by the end of 2000, but the mounting data was not analyzed properly.
