Drug giant, Pfizer, has reached an agreement that will ultimately settle most of the lawsuits filed against the company over the side effects of two of it’s drugs, Celebrex and Bextra. It expects that the $894 million dollar agreement will settle more than 90 percent of the claims filed because the drugs are alleged to have caused major side effects to the plaintiffs - heart attacks and strokes.

Pfizer hopes that this will be accomplished by year’s end and also hopes that remaining claimants will be included in the settlement.

General Counsel Amy Schulman told The Associated Press that Pfizer will fight any remaining personal injury suits with court motions or at trial. “I don’t think either side has an interest in protracting this,” Schulman said in an interview.

Out of the total settlement, $745 million will go to settle personal injury cases, $60 million will cover settlements with attorneys general in the 33 states and the District of Columbia, and $89 million will cover consumer fraud class action cases over reimbursement for money spent on the two drugs. Two additional states, Louisiana and Mississippi, still have pending cases regarding Pfizer’s promotion of the drugs.

Schulman has indicated that Pfizer had been negotiating with opposing lawyers for some time. “Litigation can be distracting, and putting these matters behind us helps our shareholders and, most importantly, patients and doctors,” Schulman said.

Pfizer had removed Bextra from the market in 2005 after Merck & Company had removed it’s painkiller, Vioxx, from the market. Merck has begun paying a 4.8 billion dollar settlement that ends about 50,000 lawsuits that claimed Vioxx caused heart attacks, strokes and death.

Celebrex is currently the only Cox-2 inhibitor that the Food and Drug Administration has allowed to stay on the market. These drugs - Bextra, Celebrex and Vioxx - were superior to the usual nonsteroidal anti-inflammatory drugs(NSAIDs) like aspirin, ibuprofen and naproxen because they inhibited only the body enzymes that produced the inflamation(Cox-2). The NSAID drugs also inhibited the Cox-2 enzyme but, in addition, inhibited the Cox-1 enzyme which is important in keeping the mucous lining of the stomach intact. Without the mucous lining, stomach ulcers and bleeding could occur.

Federal officials are reportedly investigating whether or not an engineer is to blame for running a stop signal before the fatal train crash occurred in Los Angeles last week. The crash took the lives of 25 passengers and many believe that an engineer on the train was texting on his cell phone when the freight train collided with a commuter train.

The collision happened near Chatsworth, just west of San Fernando Valley, near a 500-foot-long tunnel. The commuter train was reportedly traveling from Union Station in downtown Los Angeles to Ventura County and the impact forced the Metrolink engine back and jammed it into the passenger car.

On Sunday the National Transportation Safety Board (NTSB) supposedly confirmed that the engineer, who was also killed in the accident, failed to stop at a red signal. After two 14-year-old boys revealed to news stations that they had received a text message from the engineer just before the crash, many are suspicious that he was on his phone when he failed to stop.

Investigation Ensues

NTSB experts are now reviewing cell phone records in hopes of determining the cause of the crash that injured over 100 commuters and took the lives of many others. According to reports from Metrolink, a dispatcher tried to warn the engineer of the oncoming commuter train he was about to collide with but the call came in too late.

The accident has become the deadliest rail disaster in 15 years and the families and loved ones of those who died are already seeking legal advice and counseling in light of the recent texting news.