Beasley, Allen, Crow, Methvin, Portis & Miles, P.C.

Global sales of Vytorin fell 18 percent, while sales of Zetia dropped by 12 percent in the third quarter. The loss of sales revenue from the two drugs, combined with difficult economic conditions worldwide, have led drug maker Merck to announce that it will cut its workforce by 12 percent.

These newest job cuts come on top of cutbacks that Merck made as part of an earlier restructuring program. Merck began eliminating 10,400 jobs from its global workforce in 2005 and completed that set of cutbacks last month.

Merck’s Chief Executive, Richard Clark, acknowledged the company faced a challenging economic environment in the immediate future.

“Our current sales trends for key products, compounded by known industry and emerging economic factors, have led us to reassess the environment in which we expect to be operating between now and 2010,” he said in a statement.

According to Merck, the 12-percent reduction of its workforce translates to 6,800 employees losing their jobs and some 400 vacancies that will go unfilled. The measures should amount to a savings of $3.8 billion to $4.2 billion by the end of 2013, the company said.

Merck’s embattled cholesterol drugs Vytorin and Zetia continue to earn the company profits, but those profits continually fall as concerns over the drugs’ safety and efficacy rise. Studies have indicated that Vytorin is no more effective than cheap generics and that using it may increase the risk of developing cancer and dying from cancer.

Negative press has knocked Vytorin and its component Zetia, which is also prescribed separately, down from blockbuster status to something more of a financial and legal liability.

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