In one of the largest defective drug settlements ever, Merck & Co. will pay $4.85 billion to end thousands of state and federal lawsuits over its painkiller Vioxx. Merck officials estimated that if the deal is accepted it would end 45,000 to 50,000 personal injury lawsuits involving U.S. Vioxx users who suffered a heart attack or ischemic stroke. Merck’s executive vice president Kenneth Frazier said, “Without this settlement, the litigation might very well stretch on for years,” and called the agreement responsible and reasonable. The negotiating teams met more than 50 times in several states and spent hundreds of hours on the telephone over many months to come to an equitable deal. Merck stressed that the agreement is not a class action settlement and that it is not admitting fault. Analyst Steve Brozak of WBB Securities called Merck's handling of the litigation “a Harvard casebook study of how to deal with a problematic product.”