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Category: Opioid Lawsuits

  • Hospitals Sue Drug Companies, Seeking Opioid Settlement Money

    Hospitals Sue Drug Companies, Seeking Opioid Settlement Money

    These lawsuits are separate from those filed by thousands of American municipalities against many of the same companies.

    Hospitals are joining the fight in trying to squeeze settlement money from drug companies accused of fueling opioid abuse and overdose in the U.S.

    The High Cost Of Addiction Treatment

    Hospitals in Mississippi, Tennessee, Texas, Arizona, Florida, Kentucky and West Virginia are suing companies like Purdue Pharma, Johnson & Johnson and McKesson, a drug distributor, hoping to recoup the heavy cost of treating the opioid crisis.

    “The expense of treating overdose and opioid-addicted patients has skyrocketed, straining the resources of hospitals throughout our state,” said Lee Bond, chief executive officer of Singing River Health System in Mississippi, which is also suing.

    These lawsuits are separate from those filed by thousands of American municipalities against many of the same companies.

    Hospitals see the worst of the opioid crisis firsthand. People who overdose, or require treatment for serious illness like endocarditis, pneumonia and hepatitis, are often unable to pay for treatment.

    According to court filings cited by NPR, hospitals estimate that the cost of treating such patients amounts to an average of $107,000 per person. In just one year, providing treatment for opioid-related sickness has cost U.S. hospitals over $15 billion, according to 2012 statistics.

    “I can’t pay a thing. I don’t have a dime. So they do absorb all that cost,” said Traci Grimes, a woman from Nashville who was treated at Vanderbilt University Medical Center (which is not involved in any lawsuit) for near-fatal endocarditis, hepatitis A and C, and pneumonia.

    Hospital Lawsuits Could Open “New Can Of Worms”

    Health experts noted that hospitals may be reluctant to sue in order to protect sensitive information such as how they determine their prices for care, or their relationships with drug companies. This may garner “some unflattering attention” for some hospitals, a health analyst explained to NPR. It could potentially open “a whole new can of worms,” making it a safer choice to sit out on litigation.

    However, the downside of sitting out is that hospitals are not guaranteed to receive any of the settlement money won by municipalities, experts noted.

    Ohio Governor John Kasich and West Virginia University President Gordon Gee want more hospitals to join as plaintiffs.

    “Hospitals are directly bearing the brunt of this crisis,” it says on the website for their organization, Citizens for Effective Opioid Treatment. “U.S. hospitals provide billions of dollars annually in reimbursed care directly related to the opioid crisis.”

    Gee told NPR, “There’s always safety in mass.”

    View the original article at thefix.com

  • Four States Propose $48 Billion Settlement In Global Opioid Lawsuit

    Four States Propose $48 Billion Settlement In Global Opioid Lawsuit

    The $48 billion offer is still a far cry from the estimated $504 billion in damages caused to the country in 2015 alone.

    The attorneys general of four U.S. states have proposed a $48 billion settlement between some of the world’s biggest drug companies and states, tribes and nearly 3,000 cities and counties across the nation at what could be the peak of the opioid epidemic. 

    The offer comes shortly after what would have been the first federal opioid trial was averted by a $250 million settlement between Cardinal Health, McKesson, and AmerisourceBergen and two counties in Ohio.

    The global settlement deal was proposed by two Democratic and two Republican attorneys general of North Carolina, Pennsylvania, Texas, and Tennessee. According to NBC News, the foursome has not yet announced whether any other states are on board with their plan.

    Is $48 Billion Enough?

    However, a lawyer representing the cities and counties involved in the global suit, Paul Hanly, believes that this number is not high enough for his clients. It’s likely that negotiations will continue for another three to six months, he said.

    “This is the most complex negotiation in the history of litigation,” said Hanley.

    Last week, Hanley’s clients rejected an offer of $18 billion over the course of 18 years after it was found that New York City would have only received as little as $5 million per year from the deal, a small fraction of the $500 million per year it has spent to combat the opioid crisis. The same issue applied to other cities.

    The $48 billion offer is still a far cry from the estimated $504 billion in damages caused to the country in just the year 2015.

    Funds Would Be Delivered Over 10-Year Period

    The settlement would also be split between cash payments and services and supplies. The deal proposed for the global case would offer over $22 billion in cash as well as $26 billion in treatment drugs and delivery services, all of which would be delivered over the course of 10 years. 

    In Ohio, drug distributors Cardinal Health, McKesson, and AmerisourceBergen paid $215 million to Summit and Cuyahoga counties, while generic opioid maker Teva Pharmaceutical paid $20 million in cash and provided $25 million worth of Suboxone, a common opioid addiction treatment drug. The cash payments will also go toward treatment efforts.

    “We are looking at using this money for treatment,” said Cuyahoga County prosecutor Michael C. O’Malley. “It’s about rehabilitation and getting people straight.”

    Meanwhile, Walgreens Boots Alliance, another defendant in the Ohio case, has not yet announced its settlement with the plaintiffs. Purdue Pharma, whose name is often evoked when it comes to the opioid crisis, was also a target of these lawsuits but filed for bankruptcy in September.

    All companies involved have denied the allegations that they’re responsible for the opioid epidemic, but the three who settled last week released a joint statement saying that the deal is “an important stepping stone to achieving a global resolution and delivering meaningful relief.”

    View the original article at thefix.com

  • Jury Selection Begins In Federal Opioid Trial

    Jury Selection Begins In Federal Opioid Trial

    The trial that begins next week technically will focus on Cuyahoga and Summit counties in Ohio.

    Jury selection began on Wednesday in the first federal opioid trial, which is slated to begin on Monday (Oct. 21). 

    The lawsuit that begins next week is part of the National Prescription Opiate Litigation, which brings together more than 2,000 lawsuits against opioid manufacturers and distributors, according to NPR.

    The trial that begins next week technically has two plaintiffs—Cuyahoga and Summit counties in Ohio—but they will gauge how other trials will unfold.

    U.S. District Judge Dan Polster, who is overseeing the trial, has been clear about his desire to see parties settle out of court. 

    Negotiation Class

    In fact, last month Polster said that he will approve a “negotiation class.” Under this model, 49 governments would participate in negotiating a deal that would apply to every city and county in the country, unless the municipality explicitly opts out. The representatives of the 49 municipalities would have the opportunity to vote on potential settlements, potentially streamlining settlements between governments and manufacturers. 

    University of Connecticut law professor Alexandra Lahav said that this is an unusual approach.

    “The usual class action—the way it works is you have a class representative and they decide whether it’s a good settlement or not. Here we’re letting people vote. We have a much bigger input—that’s the novel thing here,” she said. “This is totally uncharted territory. There’s no model for any of it.”

    Time Is Of The Essence

    Polster has spoken out about his belief that the opioid cases are unique, and therefore call for unusual approaches to resolution. He has spoken about his belief that time is of the essence, so that settlement funds can be used to support people affected by opioid use disorder. Writing in a pretrial ruling, he said, “Ordinarily, the resolution of a social epidemic should be the responsibility of our other two branches of government, but these are not ordinary times.”

    While the National Prescription Opiate Litigation could result in a so-called “global settlement” that would resolve lawsuits, opioid manufacturers and producers could potentially still face criminal charges for their role in the epidemic. New York representative Max Rose (a democrat), has said, “The Sackler family does not belong in bankruptcy court, they belong in handcuffs.” 

    However, Rutgers Law School professor David Noll said that criminal charges could complicate the national litigation, which is likely why no states have filed criminal charges. 

    “There is a possibility that they’ll have to pay restitution,” he explained. “And their position will be, ‘The money which we had earmarked for the settlement now can’t be used for that purpose because we have to preserve our ability to satisfy a criminal judgment.’ That may explain why nobody has pulled the trigger on filing a criminal action against them.”

    View the original article at thefix.com

  • Two Drugmakers Settle Ahead Of Federal Cases

    Two Drugmakers Settle Ahead Of Federal Cases

    Endo and Allergan will still face ongoing litigation with dozens of other municipalities.

    Two drug makers have settled with two Ohio counties ahead of an upcoming federal opioid trial in Cleveland.

    Endo International and Allergan will pay a combined $15 million in damages to Cuyahoga and Summit counties in Ohio. Both companies avoided admitting any wrongdoing. 

    The settlement comes ahead of a landmark trial slated to start Oct. 21—which will hear arguments by local governments, Native American tribes and more from around the country alleging that the drug companies fueled the opioid crisis.

    Right now, other major drug manufacturers and distributors including Purdue Pharma, Teva, Johnson & Johnson, McKesson, and AmerisourceBergen will still proceed to trial in the fall, according to STAT News. 

    Although Endo settled, the company faces ongoing litigation with other municipalities, including more than 2,300 cases filed by counties and cities. 

    The Deal

    Endo’s deal with the Ohio counties indicates that the company could settle its suits globally for about $1.8 billion, according to FiercePharma. That’s lower than the $4 billion in settlements that was initially predicted for the company. One analyst said that the lower-than-expected settlement amount indicates that drug manufacturers may be “out of the woods.”

    After the settlement was announced, Endo and other pharmaceutical stocks were trading higher, indicating that investors were pleased with the settlement amount. Although Allergan did not comment on the settlement, Matthew Maletta, Endo’s executive vice president and chief legal officer said that the agreement was a “favorable outcome.”

    One analyst, John Leppard, said that the settlement amount from Endo was likely calculated based on what the company thought it would cost to go to trial. 

    The agreement “appears designed only to spare Endo the expense of the bellwether trial, rather than satisfying their overall potential costs in a comprehensive resolution of government-related opioid claims with the approximately 2,000 cities and counties party to the multi-district litigation,” he wrote. “The cash portion of this settlement appears intended to reflect Endo’s estimated costs of having to participate in the bellwether trial itself, rather than their overall liability or culpability.”

    In addition to the $10 million cash settlement, Endo agreed to provide the counties with up to $1 million of the drugs Vasostrict and Adrenalin free of charge. Vasostrict is a hormone used to treat diabetes, blood pressure and other conditions. Adrenalin is used in EpiPens. 

    The settlement could be an indication of the amounts that other pharmaceutical companies may settle for ahead of thousands of other upcoming lawsuits. 

    View the original article at thefix.com

  • Sacklers "Siphoned" Money From Purdue To Avoid Payouts, Lawsuit Alleges

    Sacklers "Siphoned" Money From Purdue To Avoid Payouts, Lawsuit Alleges

    A spokesperson for the Sackler family said that they were within their rights as shareholders to withdraw profits from Purdue Pharma.

    The state of Arizona has gone directly to the U.S. Supreme Court with a bold lawsuit alleging that members of the Sackler family took $4 billion from Purdue Pharma between 2008 and 2019 when they knew that the company would likely need the funds to settle opioid-related lawsuits. 

    “These transfers all took place at times when company officials, including the Sacklers, were keenly aware that Purdue was facing massive financial liabilities and that these transfers could prevent it from satisfying eventual judgments,” the suit argues. 

    “We want the Supreme Court to make sure that we hold accountable those individuals who are responsible for this epidemic,” Arizona’s Attorney General Mark Brnovich told The New York Times. “We allege that the Sacklers have siphoned billions of dollars from Purdue in recent years. They did this while knowing the company was facing massive financial liabilities.”

    The Long Shot

    The state hopes that the U.S. Supreme Court will hear the case because it involves a state as a party. However, that may be unlikely since the court rarely hears cases that have not first gone through lower courts. 

    “I do think it’s a long shot,” Brnovich said. “It’s a little different. It’s a little unorthodox. Sometimes you’ve just got to throw deep.”

    He said that the pressing need for funds to combat the opioid crisis calls for intervention at the highest level of the court system. “We don’t have time for this to take years to wind through the courts. The Supreme Court has jurisdiction, and we think they have to act.”

    Another lawyer for the state, William S. Consovoy, said that the state is looking for a quicker resolution to the case. “The urgency is a big deal here. It’s very important that we get this resolved expeditiously, and that’s one of the key reasons why the Supreme Court is the right place to do this and to do this now.”

    Sacklers’ Statement

    A spokesperson for the Sackler family said that they were within their rights as shareholders to withdraw profits from Purdue Pharma. The spokesperson added that the allegations in the lawsuit are “inconsistent with the factual record.” The Sacklers “will vigorously defend against them,” the spokesperson said.  

    The Sackler family, in addition to Purdue Pharma, have become regular targets for opioid-related lawsuits, in part for their alleged misleading marketing of the drug OxyContin. 

    It is not clear when the court will decide whether or not to hear Arizona’s lawsuit. 

    View the original article at thefix.com

  • Families, Activists Protest At Opioid Lawsuit Hearing In Massachusetts

    Families, Activists Protest At Opioid Lawsuit Hearing In Massachusetts

    Protestors gathered outside of Suffolk County Superior Court  to bring attention to the personal losses incurred by the opioid crisis.

    Protestors, including family members who lost loved ones to overdoses, gathered outside a courthouse in Boston, Massachusetts, to draw attention to the human toll of the opioid epidemic as a judge weighed a request to dismiss a lawsuit brought by the Bay State against OxyContin manufacturer Purdue Pharma and the Sackler family, which owns the company.

    The suit – one of approximately 2,000 currently pending against Purdue, which manufactured the aforementioned prescription pain medication, and other pharmaceutical companies – alleged that Purdue made false claims about OxyContin’s addictive properties, and targeted prescribers with aggressive sales techniques. 

    Attorneys for Purdue and the Sacklers have alleged that the suit has made distorted and broadly general claims in order to lay blame for the epidemic on a single manufacturer.

    Losing Loved Ones

    Approximately 100 protestors gathered outside of Suffolk County Superior Court on August 2 to bring attention to the personal losses incurred by the opioid crisis.

    “They need to see the families,” said Cheryl Juaire, who lost her 23-year-old son to a fatal overdose in 2011. “They need to be held accountable for the deaths of our children. We need restitution.”

    Massachusetts Attorney General Maura Healy has attempted to speak to those needs with the suit, which she filed in 2018 against Purdue, its executives and the Sackler Family. The suit was unique in that it focused only on Purdue and not other manufacturers or wholesalers and was the first to name Sackler family members as defendants. The tactic has since been adopted by other states and cities in their lawsuits against the company.

    As Time noted, the suit cited a statement by former Purdue Pharma president Richard Sackler, who said at a launch party for OxyContin in 1996 that the new medication would be “followed by a blizzard of prescriptions that will bury the competition.” 

    Purdue Pushes Back

    In court filings, the family stated that Sacklers’ remarks had been taken out of context, and actually referred to a real blizzard that had made him late for the event.

    Lawyers for Purdue and the Sackler family have sought to downplay the state’s allegations, which they called a “misguided and very political effort to try to place blame on a single manufacturer,” and noted that federal and state data which showed that Purdue’s drugs accounted for a fraction of drugs distributed in Massachusetts, and that overdose deaths were now largely fueled by heroin and fentanyl.

    But state attorneys countered these claims by alleging that Purdue’s sales representatives targeted Massachusetts-based prescribers and established a pain program at Massachusetts General Hospital to reportedly promote their drugs. 

    Protestors at the Suffolk County court hope that any money recovered by lawsuits like the one in Massachusetts goes to individuals impacted by the opioid crisis and not to other sources. Ryan Hampton, a Los Angeles resident who organized the August 2 rally, pointed to Purdue’s recent settlement in Oklahoma, where $200 million of a $270 million payment by the company will go to a national resource center at Oklahoma State University.

    “We have an opportunity to fund solutions,” said Hampton to Time. “So it’s worrisome that we’ll see this firehose of money from settlements and it’ll just be misspent and all of this work to bring some justice to this will go to waste.”

    View the original article at thefix.com

  • Will Nearly 2,000 Pending Opioid Lawsuits End In A Master Settlement?

    Will Nearly 2,000 Pending Opioid Lawsuits End In A Master Settlement?

    Attorneys are attempting to put together a settlement that would make a “meaningful impact on the deeply tragic opioid crisis.”

    There are now nearly 2,000 opioid lawsuits pending in federal court. States, counties and cities across the U.S. are seeking to hold drug companies like Purdue Pharma, Johnson & Johnson and McKesson accountable for fueling the national opioid epidemic.

    The companies are accused of aggressive and improper marketing of opioid drugs like OxyContin and downplaying the risks of developing a drug use disorder.

    With so many lawsuits seeking money damages for the devastating impact that opioid abuse has inflicted on American communities, the question of how they will be dealt with remains.

    The Master Plan

    In June, a group of attorneys representing 1,200 counties, cities and towns proposed a plan to reach a settlement with two-dozen drugmakers and distributors. One of the attorneys, Joe Rice, was the architect of the 1998 Master Settlement between 46 states and major U.S. cigarette manufacturers, WBUR reported. “Tens of billions of dollars would be needed to make a significant—a real significant impact on this epidemic,” said Rice.

    The plan is “ambitious and creative but fundamentally flawed,” according to attorney Mark A. Gottlieb, executive director of the Public Health Advocacy Institute at Northeastern University School of Law. Gottlieb, wary of its potential impact, emphasized the importance of making a strong statement with the massive settlement that would provide closure for both parties. Ideally it would be a symbolic end to the opioid crisis.

    “While any new ‘master settlement’ must primarily compensate the plaintiffs for their losses, a settlement that simply moves money around, as the tobacco settlement did, has no chance at having a meaningful impact on the deeply tragic opioid crisis,” wrote Gottlieb in his commentary.

    Safeguarding The Future

    Gottlieb proposed securing a portion of the settlement that will go to future safeguards against similar crises. He suggests an independent foundation to serve as a watchdog over the pain management and addiction treatment industries, to provide opioid prescribing education, to fund treatment and prevention programs, to fund addiction-related medications such as naloxone and buprenorphine, and to advise policymakers on relevant legislation.

    “We must ensure that we do not squander the opportunity to address the opioid crisis through a coordinated public health approach in the next settlement,” Gottlieb wrote.

    View the original article at thefix.com

  • Expert: Johnson & Johnson Played Bigger Role In Opioid Crisis Than Purdue Pharma

    Expert: Johnson & Johnson Played Bigger Role In Opioid Crisis Than Purdue Pharma

    Johnson & Johnson is less well-known as an opioid manufacturer, but the company makes Duragesic, a fentanyl patch, and produced Nucynta, an opioid, until 2015.

    The company may be best-known for its sweet-smelling baby washes and lotion, but Johnson & Johnson has a sinister side, according to an expert witness who said that the company may have played an even bigger role in the opioid epidemic than Purdue Pharma. 

    Johnson & Johnson “did everything it possibly could to get doctors to prescribe more and more opioids,” said Dr. Andrew Kolodny, co-director of opioid policy research at Brandeis University’s Heller School for Social Policy and Management, according to Bloomberg. 

    “In some ways,” the company was “worse” than Purdue, Kolodny said, according to CNN. 

    Kolodny was speaking as an expert witness for the state of Oklahoma, which is suing Johnson & Johnson for contributing to the opioid epidemic. The state previously reached settlements with Purdue Pharma for $270 million and with Teva Pharmaceuticals for $85 million, although neither company admitted to wrongdoing. 

    Purdue Pharma, the maker of OxyContin, has become well-known for its deceptive marketing practices and lavish rewards to doctors who prescribed lots of opioid pills. The Sackler family, members of whom own the company, have been vilified for what many see as their active management of misinformation. 

    Johnson & Johnson is less well-known as an opioid manufacturer, but the company makes Duragesic, a fentanyl patch, and produced the opioid pill Nucynta until 2015, when it sold the product for $1 billion. Johnson & Johnson had products that were natural, semi-synthetic and synthetic opioids, meaning it was active in many spaces around opioid marketing. 

    “Until I had an opportunity to review discovery documents I really was not aware of how bad Johnson & Johnson was,” Kolodny said. 

    When he had tried to visit Tasmanian Alkaloids, a former subsidiary of Johnson & Johnson, Kolodny said it was “clear” that the company did not want him around. Kolodny also said that despite the fact that he has played a prevalent role in crafting opioid policy in response to the epidemic, no one from Johnson & Johnson ever reached out to him. 

    Despite the state’s assertion that Johnson & Johnson contributed to opioid abuse in Oklahoma, the company continues to deny responsibility. 

    “The testimony of the State’s witness, Dr. Kolodny, was filled with rampant speculation and conclusions not derived from facts,” the company’s attorney John Sparks said in a statement. “The evidence remains that Johnson & Johnson and its former subsidiaries appropriately and responsibly met all laws and regulations on the manufacturing, sale and distribution of active pharmaceutical ingredients and pharmaceutical products and did everything you’d expect a responsible company to do.”

    However, Kolodny maintained that the public needs to know about the role that Johnson & Johnson and other manufacturers played in the opioid crisis. 

    “All of that helped change the attitudes in this country about smoking,” he said. “I believe we can see the same benefit [from] opioid litigation.”

    View the original article at thefix.com