Texas Lawyer, "Houston Fen-Phen Docket Downsized"

          The end to fen-phen litigation in Houston is in sight. With thousands of suits already settled nationwide, a three-judge panel overseeing the fen-phen docket in Harris County agreed on Sept. 27 to set 31 cases for trial between February 2002 and July 2002. Once those cases are tried, or more likely settle, judges in Harris County will have worked through more than 1,300 fen-phen cases, although only two of them actually went to trial and neither to a verdict.
          The setting of trial dates for the final suits comes four years after the U.S. Food and Drug Administration asked drug companies to withdraw fenfluramine, the "fen" part of the diet drug combo, and the related drug dexfenfluramine, or Redux, from the market. In September 1997, Wyeth-Ayerst Laboratories, the pharmaceutical arm of American Home Products Corp., pulled them from the market after studies suggested a link between the drugs and heart-valve leaks, as well as a rare but deadly lung