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Opioid Litigation Daily Media Report - 1/31/18

MDL

Judge Dan Polster Is Singlehandedly Trying to Solve the Opioid Crisis
Jan 31, 2018 | Bloomberg
By Jef Feeley & Jared S. Hopkins

A Cleveland judge says the U.S. government has punted on the nationwide opioid epidemic. So he’s grabbing the ball and running with it.
As opioid crisis grows, judge aims for solutions, settlement
Jan 31, 2018 | Associated Press
By Geoff Mulvihill

The goal is impressive: Hammer out a legal deal that starts guiding the nation out of an epidemic of opioid addiction.
Meet The Judge Who's Steering The Epic Opioid MDL
Jan 30, 2018 | Law360
By Emily Field & Jeff Overley

U.S. District Judge Dan Aaron Polster has a lofty goal for historic litigation over the opioid crisis — a fast and dramatic reduction of narcotic painkiller sales — that reflects his penchant for brokering salutary settlements that don’t require years of drawn-out legal maneuvering.
Paul Hanly and Jayne Conroy belong to an exclusive 'club' (EDITORIAL)
Jan 30, 2018 | Madiston St. Clair Record (IL)
By Staff

“Ideally, this should be handled by the legislative and executive branches, our federal government, and our state governments. They haven’t seemed to have done a whole lot. So it’s here.”
Opioid Litigation: Court Asks US FDA To Attend Education Session
Jan 30, 2018 | Pink Sheet
By Brenda Sandburg

Judge overseeing multidistrict litigation convenes meeting with senior pharma executives, government plaintiffs and others to learn about supply-chain dynamics and other issues to resolve more than 200 suits.

President Trump SOTU

Trump Spent 49 Seconds Of SOTU On Opioid Crisis That Claimed 64,000 Lives In A Year
Jan 30, 2018 | Huffington Post
By Jason Cherkis & Nick Wing

President Donald Trump briefly mentioned the opioid epidemic during his State of the Union speech on Tuesday night, suggesting he’d address the matter through immigration reform and tougher drug enforcement.
Trump seems to see opioid crisis as primarily a law enforcement problem (EDITORIAL)
Jan 31, 2018 | Washington Post
By Paige Winfield Cunningham

Last night, President Trump indicated once again that he views the nation's opioid abuse crisis as more of an issue to be dealt with by law enforcement than by medical professionals.
Trump vows to stop 'scourge' of opioid epidemic, calls for crackdown on drug dealers
Jan 31, 2018 | CNBC
By Dan Magnan

Trump: My administration is committed to fighting our drug epidemic Trump: My administration is committed to fighting our drug epidemic 41 Mins Ago | 01:23 President Donald Trump lauded a New Mexico police officer who stopped a pregnant woman from injecting heroin — and then adopted her child — as he called for a crackdown on "drug dealers and pushers" to stem the massive opioid epidemic.
Trump: US must get 'much tougher on drug dealers and pushers'
Jan 31, 2018 | The Hill
By Rachel Roubein

President Trump said the country must get “much tougher on drug dealers and pushers” to end the opioid epidemic in his State of the Union address on Tuesday.
Trump focuses on law enforcement in combating opioid abuse
Jan 31, 2018 | Washington Post
By Paige Cunningham

President Trump briefly mentioned the opioid epidemic, but offered few new details about how his administration might tackle the nationwide crisis.

Northeast (PA, MA, NY)

Dauphin County commissioners file suit against opioid manufacturers, doctors
Jan 31, 2018 | ABC 27 News (PA)
By Janel Knight

Dauphin County commissioners will file a lawsuit against opioid manufacturers and several doctors for their roles in the deadly and costly epidemic.
Dauphin County sues opioid manufacturers
Jan 30, 2018 | PennLive (PA)
By Steve Marroni

With more than 100 overdoses in Dauphin County last year, the county is fighting back against those who make the drugs.
Boston May Seek To Sue Pharmaceutical Companies For Opioid Crisis
Jan 31, 2018 | WGBH (MA)
By Brendan Deady & Daniel Medwed

As the opioid epidemic consumes lives, futures and fiscal resources, many municipalities are turning to the courts to try to force pharmaceutical companies to shoulder some of the responsibility. Audio Link: https://news.wgbh.org/2018/01/30/politics-government/boston-may-seek-sue-pharmaceutical-companies-opioid-crisis
Lawsuit could grant Onondaga funding to help alleviate opioid crisis
Jan 31, 2018 | The Daily Orange (NY)
By Charlie Sawyer

Legislators and public health experts speculate Onondaga County’s lawsuit against several pharmaceutical companies could earn the county reparations for preventative spending on the opioid crisis.
At least 14 NY counties and NYC suing opioid companies
Jan 31, 2018 | Press Connects (NY)
By Hannah Schwarz

At least 14 counties across New York are suing pharmaceutical companies for what they're claiming are deceptive marketing practices meant to minimize the addiction risks associated with opioids.

Midwest (IN, OH)

Logansport officials consider joining class-action suit against opioid manufacturers, distributors
Jan 31, 2018 | Pharos Tribune (IN)
By Mitchell Kirk

Logansport officials are considering joining over 15 governments across Indiana in a lawsuit against over 20 pharmaceutical companies seeking compensation for the nation's opioid epidemic.
Howard County files lawsuit against major opioid distributors, manufacturers
Jan 30, 2018 | Kokomo Tribune (IN)
By Tim Bath

Howard County has filed a civil lawsuit against opioid manufacturers and distributors, alleging they are to blame for the deadly, ongoing drug crisis on a national, state and local level.
Commissioners preparing to file opioid lawsuit
Jan 31, 2018 | The Advertiser Tribune (OH)
By Jimmy Flint

Seneca County commissioners announced Tuesday morning they are to file a lawsuit they hope will help in the fight against the opioid epidemic.
Franklin County officially sues opioid makers, distributors
Jan 30, 2018 | The Columbus Dispatch (OH)
By Kimball Perry

Franklin County officially joined a national lawsuit Tuesday that accuses prescription opioid makers and distributors of being a public nuisance by improperly fueling the national epidemic of opioid addiction and overdose deaths.
Seneca County joins lawsuit against opioid producers
Jan 30, 2018 | WTOL (OH)
By Jonathan Monk

A local county has taken a step in a national legal battle against the opioid epidemic.

West (CO)

Colorado county blames drug firms for opioid epidemic in lawsuit
Jan 30, 2018 | Associated Press
By Staff

A Colorado county has filed a lawsuit against big pharmaceutical companies, blaming them for the statewide opioid overdoes epidemic.
Small Colorado County Sues Pharmaceutical Giants
Jan 30, 2018 | Northern Colorado Public Radio (CO)
By Stephanie Daniel

Huerfano County in southern Colorado is suing a long list of the nation’s top pharmaceutical companies. The lawsuit claims residents of the county were led to believe opioids, like oxycodone and Percocet, were safe. Instead, the drugs were highly addictive and, in some cases, led to overdoses and deaths.

Southeast (NC)

Orange County joins growing push to make drug companies pay for opioid crisis
Jan 30, 2018 | The Herald Sun (NC)
By Tammy Grub

Orange County will join over 200 governments nationwide, including 15 in North Carolina, suing drug makers and distributors over the opioid crisis.

Commentary and FYIs

Statement from FDA Commissioner Scott Gottlieb, M.D., on new steps to help prevent new addiction, curb abuse and overdose related to opioid products (PRESS RELEASE)
Jan 30, 2018 | FDA
By Dr. Scott Gottlieb

The issue of opioid misuse and abuse remains one of my highest priorities and we believe it’s going to take carefully developed, sustained, and coordinated action by everyone involved to reduce the tide of opioid addiction and death afflicting our communities; while maintaining appropriate prescribing for patients in medical need. We recognize both the urgency and complexity of this crisis and are taking several steps today toward these goals.
Racing to replace opioids, biopharma is betting on pain drugs with a checkered past
Jan 31, 2018 | STAT News
By Damian Garde

It was supposed to be a $10 billion idea, one that would help wean the world off its opioid dependence and give the drug industry a bounty of lucrative new products.
DEA launches crackdown on pharmacies, over-prescribers
Jan 31, 2018 | The Washington Post
By Sari Horwitz & Scott Higham

Attorney General Jeff Sessions said Tuesday that, over the next 45 days, a "surge" of Drug Enforcement Administration agents and investigators will focus on pharmacies and prescribers who are dispensing unusual or disproportionate amounts of drugs.
Drug companies submerged WV in opioids: One town of 3,000 got 21 million pills
Jan 30, 2018 | ArsTechnica
By Beth Mole

Drug companies hosed tiny towns in West Virginia with a deluge of addictive and deadly opioid pills over the last decade, according to an ongoing investigation by the House Energy and Commerce Committee.
Nation needs leadership to fight rising opioid epidemic (EDITORIAL)
Jan 30, 2018 | Albany Times Union (NY)
By Daniel P. McCoy

This month, the County of Albany filed litigation against five major pharmaceutical companies for their role in helping to create a national opioid crisis. Our lawsuit was joined with about 200 similar lawsuits by other municipalities across the nation. The federal judge overseeing the litigation, Judge Daniel Polster, expressing urgency, has ordered all parties into immediate settlement discussions this week.

Broadcast Media Coverage

News 5 Today 6am
Jan 31, 2018 | KOAA (NBC)
By Colorado Springs, CO

Video Link: http://app.criticalmention.com/app/#clip/view/32357617?token=46fad8c3-4432-4522-8ae6-93ef032f2c5e
WTOL News 11 Daybreak on FOX36
Jan 31, 2018 | WUPW (Fox)
By Toledo, OH

Video Link: http://app.criticalmention.com/app/#clip/view/32357623?token=46fad8c3-4432-4522-8ae6-93ef032f2c5e
ABC27 News Daybreak at 6:00A
Jan 31, 2018 | WHTM (ABC)
By Harrisburg, PA

Video Link: http://app.criticalmention.com/app/#clip/view/32357669?token=46fad8c3-4432-4522-8ae6-93ef032f2c5e
Bay News 9 Your Overnight News
Jan 31, 2018 | BAY9 (BAY9)
By Tampa, FL

Video Link: http://app.criticalmention.com/app/#clip/view/32357896?token=46fad8c3-4432-4522-8ae6-93ef032f2c5e

MDL

Judge Dan Polster Is Singlehandedly Trying to Solve the Opioid Crisis

Jan 31, 2018 | Bloomberg

By Jef Feeley & Jared S. Hopkins

A Cleveland judge says the U.S. government has punted on the nationwide opioid epidemic. So he’s grabbing the ball and running with it.
U.S. District Judge Daniel Polster has summoned pharma executives, law enforcement, government officials and lawyers to his court on Wednesday as he tries to forge a deal that would address the crisis and resolve more than 200 lawsuits stemming from it.
It’s a daring strategy even for a 20-year veteran judge who doesn’t shy away from seemingly intractable conflicts. Polster has said he hopes to strike a deal this year to offset the billions of dollars in costs U.S. municipalities face in dealing with an epidemic that claims 150 American lives each day.
“It would be fantastic if he can put together a settlement that really addresses these issues in that short a period,” said Jane Eggen, a law professor at Widener University in Delaware who teaches mass-tort law. It’s an “ambitious way to start.”
The rising body count and drain on public coffers spurred Polster to call the summit, putting on hold federal lawsuits against opioid makers including Purdue Pharma Inc., Johnson & Johnson and Endo International Plc and drug distributors McKesson Corp. and Cardinal Health Inc. and others.
“This is an unusual case,” the 66-year-old Harvard Law School graduate said in an interview. “The problem is urgent, life-threatening and ongoing. I took this step because I thought it would be the most effective path.”
Big Pharma’s Tobacco Moment as Star Lawyers Push Opioid Suits
Polster doesn’t hide from controversy. In February, he took a swipe at President Donald Trump for questioning the fairness of federal judges. A public office holder who makes such comments, he said, “calls into question his or her own legitimacy.”
Two years ago, he helped mediate a deal on the heightened security zone outside the Republican convention in Cleveland, cutting the planned 3.5 square miles in half and creating new spaces for protesters.
Polster pushed for months to reach a deal in a 1999 dispute between the siblings who owned the San Francisco 49ers football team, according to the Mercury News. Denise DeBartolo York sued to remove her brother Eddie, who countersued in Ohio. She got the team and he stepped away.
The former federal prosecutor is also something of an environmentalist. His wife Deborah Coleman encouraged him to start cycling in 2007 instead of driving, The Cleveland Jewish News reported. Polster organized a five-mile bike ride in 2010 that combined exercise, enjoyment of nature, and a “little Jewish learning,” with Polster giving a lesson on the holiday of Shavuot, according to the article.
How the U.S. Opioid Crisis Spiraled Out of Control (Video)
For the opioid summit, Polster is asking staff for the Food and Drug Administration and the Drug Enforcement Administration for their views on how to better keep addictive painkillers out of abusers’ hands. Half the meeting is slated for information gathering and the rest on settlement proposals.
“Judge Polster does not sit in an ivory tower, but in a courthouse in the middle of Cleveland, Ohio, an area devastated by the opioid epidemic, with no end in sight to the deaths and heartache,” said Jayne Conroy, a lawyer representing cities and counties in the litigation. “He is committed, hard-working and experienced.”
None of the companies would say which of their executives were going. McKesson spokeswoman Kristin Hunter Chasen said the company wanted to address a “complicated” public-health crisis. Johnson & Johnson’s Janssen unit looks forward to being “part of the ongoing dialogue,” spokeswoman Jessica Castles Smith said. Purdue Pharma, Endo and Cardinal Health declined to comment.
Ohio Attorney General Michael DeWine will brief Polster about his state’s skyrocketing rate of opioid overdoses. County morgues are full and officials are stacking corpses in cold-storage trailers. DeWine, a Republican candidate for governor, has made the opioid crisis his signature issue.
The parties have been talking. Purdue Pharma officials floated trial balloons in November for a deal with state attorneys general that would cover all opioid makers, people familiar with the talks said.Fruitless Talks
But Jim Boffetti, a New Hampshire assistant attorney general, said the talks with Purdue officials were fruitless. “I haven’t gotten the least indication that they are willing to take responsibility,” he said. “We’re hoping the judge can change that attitude.”
“Maybe if he can get the right people in the room and get those people thinking of what’s doable, then something good will come out of it,” said Elizabeth Burch, a University of Georgia law professor who teaches about complex litigation.
Anupam Jena, a Harvard Medical School health economist, estimates it would take $250 billion in annual funding to make a meaningful dent in the crisis, with funds for treatment, police departments and compensation for victims’ families. That amount may be much more than the opioid makers and drug distributors are willing to pay.
Polster knows he’s in an unusual position: a judge overseeing a massive lawsuit while trying to craft a 50-state remedy to the epidemic.
“It’s not typical to have the judiciary involved” in such a way, he said in the interview. “We are not policy makers.” But as Polster has said, he sees it as his duty to tackle the “100 percent man-made” crisis.
“I’m not happy or unhappy” to be the point man on opioid litigation, he said. “Whether I’m happy doesn’t matter. We don’t pick our cases.”

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As opioid crisis grows, judge aims for solutions, settlement

Jan 31, 2018 | Associated Press

By Geoff Mulvihill

The goal is impressive: Hammer out a legal deal that starts guiding the nation out of an epidemic of opioid addiction.
How and when that can happen, if at all, is the subject of talks scheduled to begin Wednesday in a federal courthouse in Cleveland.
The judge is bringing together lawyers for governments across the country, drugmakers, distributors and others to start the conversation. Because the aim is to broker a settlement, the judge has closed the discussions to the public and media.
A look at how the sides got to this point and some of the details they have to work out:
THE EPIDEMIC
Opioid addictions and overdoses are a deepening crisis for the country.
The U.S. Centers of Diseases Control and Prevention says 42,000 people died of overdoses in 2016 from opioids, a class of drug that includes powerful prescription painkillers such as OxyContin and Vicodin; illegal heroin; and fentanyl, a strong synthetic drug sold both through prescriptions and on the street.
President Donald Trump last year declared the crisis a national public health emergency, and a bipartisan National Governors Association letter this month urged him to provide more federal money and coordination for addressing the problem.
In addition to costing lives, officials have worried that it’s hurting the workforce and overwhelming child welfare systems as children of addicts flood the system. In their legal complaint, officials in Everett, Washington, blamed opioid addiction for a spike in homelessness.
A White House Council of Economic Advisers report last year found the national economic impact of opioid addiction at just over $500 billion a year.
THE LAWSUITS
Cities and counties of all sizes have sued companies that make and distribute prescription opioids. Among the plaintiffs so far: Philadelphia; the state of Ohio; Princeton, West Virginia; the Cherokee Nation; and a consortium of counties across Wisconsin.
More than 250 such claims filed in federal courts across the country have been consolidated under Judge Dan Polster, who is based in Cleveland.
Polster has called the epidemic “100 percent man-made” and asserted that other branches of government have “punted” on solving it. He is pushing for a resolution before the case goes to trial.
He has invited many parties to the table, including ones that technically do not have cases under his watch. Addiction experts are scheduled to address the lawyers on Wednesday.
The judge asked Ohio Attorney General Mike DeWine to represent a group of at least nine states that have sued the industry in state courts. He also invited representatives of a group of about 40 state attorneys general that have not sued but have joined together to investigate the industry; at least one state attorney general from that group, Tennessee’s Herbert Slatery III, was planning to be there. That group already has had some settlement talks with companies.
Additionally, officials with the federal Drug Enforcement Agency and the U.S. Food and Drug Administration are being asked to head to Cleveland, as are representatives of insurance companies and the firms that are defendants in the lawsuits.
THE JUDGE
Polster was nominated by President Bill Clinton and has been on the bench since 1998. He has made clear that he wants to use the cases before him as a way to forge a solution to the opioid crisis — not just a legal resolution.
“What we’ve got to do is dramatically reduce the number of pills that are out there, and make sure that the pills that are out there are being used properly,” Polster said in an earlier hearing in the case, which was assigned to him in part because Ohio has been hit hard by opioids. “Because we all know that a whole lot of them have gone walking, with devastating results.”
Polster is a judge with a history of trying to settle cases before they get to trial.
He drew attention last year for a speech he made after President Donald Trump criticized the federal judiciary. Without naming the president, Polster said that a public office holder who makes those types of comments “calls into question his or her own legitimacy.”
WHY SETTLE?
For the drug industry, it could be easier to enter into one massive settlement than deal with hundreds of claims before multiple judges.
For governments, working together may represent the best chance of not only getting money to pay for treatment and other costs related to the epidemic but also to force reforms.
Perhaps the most comparable example of such a sweeping settlement over a public health epidemic came in 1998, when the four largest tobacco companies agreed to pay 46 states more than $200 billion over 25 years. The money was to fund public health programs and anti-smoking campaigns.
Legally, there is a major difference between opioids and tobacco: Prescription painkillers are approved by the federal government, prescribed by doctors and have legitimate medical uses.
That’s a point the companies that manufacture and distribute the drugs make in court papers as they try to minimize their responsibility for the crisis, even as they say they want to help solve it.
DECISIONS AHEAD
There’s no way of knowing how much money a settlement would cost the pharmaceutical industry, if one is ever reached. In New York City’s lawsuit filed this month, it asked for more than $500 million.
To reach a settlement, the parties will need to figure out more than the price.
How much of the settlement would be the responsibility of the name-brand manufacturers that do most of the opioid marketing? How much would be the responsibility of the companies that sell even more pills as generics? What about distributors and drug store chains, which are named in some of the lawsuits?
And what about restrictions on how money in a settlement is spent? States used payments from the tobacco settlement to help balance budgets and for government services outside public health.
In the opioids case, some negotiators might insist on provisions to prevent that from happening. Various governments want to use money to pay for emergency responders burdened by the crisis, as well as education and treatment programs.
Paul Hanly, a lawyer who represents nearly 200 local governments that have sued drugmakers and distributors, said his clients have a wide range of interests aside from money.
Some are deeply concerned about limiting the types of medical conditions for which opioids could be prescribed. For others, crackdowns on diverted drugs — prescription medicines stolen or fraudulently prescribed to be sold on the black market — are a top priority.

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Meet The Judge Who's Steering The Epic Opioid MDL

Jan 30, 2018 | Law360

By Emily Field & Jeff Overley

U.S. District Judge Dan Aaron Polster has a lofty goal for historic litigation over the opioid crisis — a fast and dramatic reduction of narcotic painkiller sales — that reflects his penchant for brokering salutary settlements that don’t require years of drawn-out legal maneuvering.
udge Polster, who’s been on the federal bench in Ohio since 1998, is known for a hands-on approach aimed at rapidly resolving lawsuits, attorneys and former colleagues say. In this litigation, which alleges reckless opioid sales, Judge Polster’s urgency stems from the severity of the opioid epidemic, which claimed 42,000 lives in 2016.
The Judicial Panel on Multidistrict Litigation has tasked Judge Polster with shepherding more than 250 lawsuits that augur a potential day of reckoning for the pharmaceutical industry. The JPML cited his experience with huge cases, as well as the opioid epidemic’s impact on Ohio, where 3,500 residents died of opioid overdoses in 2016 — more than 8 percent of the national toll in a state with less than 4 percent of the U.S. population.

“I doubt there’s anyone in Ohio who doesn’t have a family member, a friend, a child of a friend or the parent of a friend who hasn’t been somehow impacted,” Judge Polster, a Cleveland native, told Law360.

According to the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention, the opioid epidemic caused average U.S. life expectancy to drop in 2015 and 2016 — the first back-to-back annual decline since the early 1960s. If the CDC finds that another decline occurred in 2017, it will be the longest streak since life expectancy dropped from 1916 through 1918, Judge Polster noted.

In the opioid MDL, part of Judge Polster’s challenge is logistical. While MDLs are always large, they often feature a homogeneous pack of plaintiffs targeting one corporation. By contrast, the opioid lawsuits have been filed by a diverse cast that includes local governments, hospitals, unions and Native American tribes. They are targeting numerous companies with different business models, including drugmakers, wholesale distributors and pharmacies.

Cathy Yanni, one of three special masters in the opioid MDL, told Law360 that Judge Polster will bring vim and vigor to the case. Yanni worked with Judge Polster — who rides his bike to court when weather permits — in a previous MDL involving medical contrast agents, and she suggested that he brought an Energizer Bunny-like devotion to the litigation.

“I got texts, emails, phone calls every day of the week,” Yanni told Law360.

At one point, Judge Polster took a vacation to the Galapagos Islands, which she thought would be a respite. Not so, it turned out.

“He was texting me from Ecuador, from the boat — he doesn’t quit,” Yanni said. “He’s a man with endless energy.”

Judge Polster readily concedes that the opioid MDL is “an incredibly complex case.” It will be difficult enough to supervise the litigation, to say nothing of steering the litigation toward settlements that save lives.

“That’s always one of the challenges of an [MDL], is how to structure it and how to manage it,” the judge said.

He added that “some of the best lawyers in the country” are involved and that he is “always open to suggestions from the lawyers and the parties on how to manage the case.”

Another challenge for Judge Polster is the sheer intractability of the opioid crisis. It remains to be seen whether Judge Polster — who recently declared that other branches of government “have punted” on the issue — can guide the litigants toward settlements that actually make a difference.

But there are signs that his ambitious goal of sharply reducing opioid prescriptions is in fact realistic. For example, the CDC last year reported that the amount of opioids prescribed in the U.S. dropped 18 percent from 2010 to 2015.

The first glimmers of whether quick settlements are possible in the opioid MDL may be seen at a closed-door hearing set for Wednesday in Judge Polster’s courtroom. The full-day hearing will be devoted entirely to “preliminary settlement discussions,” according to a court order.

Asked about the MDL’s significance, Judge Polster said: “I consider it an incredible honor that my colleagues on the [JPML] felt that they could entrust these cases to me because of the complexity and the importance to our country. I can’t envision a higher or more somber responsibility.”

Before taking the bench, Judge Polster was a federal prosecutor focused on economic crimes and antitrust enforcement. His former colleague Ann Rowland, who recently retired from the U.S. attorney’s office in northern Ohio, said that Polster’s wide-ranging community involvement — including years of tutoring a local youth — affords the judge a firsthand look at the crisis.

“He understands — on perhaps a visceral level — the impact of the opioid epidemic on the community,” Rowland said.
The opioid lawsuits allege that drugmakers exaggerated painkiller benefits and downplayed their risks and that drug distributors turned a blind eye to suspicious orders that flooded communities with highly addictive pills. Damages related to health care and law enforcement could rival the $200 billion tobacco settlement of the late 1990s, plaintiffs lawyers say.

The explosive allegations and huge financial stakes provide all the ingredients for a chaotic, never-ending battle royal in the courtroom. But Judge Polster will likely be undaunted, said Patrick McLaughlin, who was the U.S. attorney for northern Ohio when Judge Polster was a prosecutor.

“Because of the numbers of litigants, it’s a monster case,” McLaughlin said. “But his approach to trying to resolve the case as early as possible is consistent [with his approach] since he first took the federal bench.”

“He can be very aggressive with all the parties in seeing that they all work hard to achieve a resolution short of full-blown litigation,” McLaughlin added.
During the past five years, Judge Polster dispensed with 165 product liability cases on his docket, while just one reached trial, court records show. The trial occurred in an MDL involving gadolinium-based contrast dyes used in medical procedures, and the JPML singled out that MDL in shipping the opioid litigation to Judge Polster.

The gadolinium case provided Judge Polster with “valuable insight into the management of complex, multidistrict litigation,” and “we have no doubt that Judge Polster will steer this litigation on a prudent course,” the JPML wrote.

Peter Burg of Burg Simpson Eldredge Hersh & Jardine PC, a plaintiffs lawyer in the gadolinium litigation, described the judge as “scholarly” in his legal analysis and “compassionate in terms of his desire ultimately to get to a result that will do some good.”

"He was certainly participatory in trying to help the parties and their legal counsel get to a settlement resolution,” Burg said. “I've been in MDLs where the judges have a very hands-off approach to the settlement dynamics — that was not Judge Polster.”

Like the opioid MDL, the gadolinium MDL was complicated by the presence of multiple defendants — including GE Healthcare Inc., Bayer Healthcare Pharmaceuticals Inc. and Mallinckrodt PLC. Nonetheless, the vast majority of roughly 1,000 cases in the gadolinium MDL were settled, with only one case going to trial, resulting in a $5 million verdict for a patient and his wife.

But past performance is no guarantee of future results, Judge Polster said. The opioid MDL has hundreds of litigants with varied and competing interests, and the guy with the gavel can only do so much.

“I don’t want [the litigation] to drag out for years and years. … But ultimately, it’s not up to me,” Judge Polster said. “I can’t control what happens — control the lawyers or the parties. I can make suggestions. I can try and influence things. But I’m just one person.”

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Paul Hanly and Jayne Conroy belong to an exclusive 'club' (EDITORIAL)

Jan 30, 2018 | Madiston St. Clair Record (IL)

By Staff

“Ideally, this should be handled by the legislative and executive branches, our federal government, and our state governments. They haven’t seemed to have done a whole lot. So it’s here.”
That's the candid opinion expressed by U.S. District Judge Dan Polster with regard to the multidistrict litigation he's overseeing in Cleveland against opioid manufacturers and distributors.
Polster supports a negotiated settlement, and one of the biggest opioid manufacturers, Purdue Pharma, is reported to have floated offers with the states.
If the resolution of the opioid problem rightfully belongs to the legislative and executive branches and the defendants might be ready to settle, why get the courts involved in setting up an MDL? Who benefits from that?
There is one group. It's an “old boys (and girls) club,” consisting of the lucky few attorneys who consistently get picked to participate in an otherwise unproductive process that leads to their enrichment without benefiting the clients much at all.
It’s the same gents and ladies, mostly, who split the millions in attorneys fees in the $200 billion tobacco settlement in 1998 and profited again and again in big tort cases involving VW diesels, Vioxx, the BP Deepwater Horizon disaster, and more.
There’s men like Paul Hanly of Simmons Hanly Conroy, who was appointed by Judge Polster to serve as one of two lead counsel overseeing the plaintiff side of the opioid litigation, and women like his law partner Jayne Conroy.
“The same five lawyers are involved in practically every proceeding,” says University of Georgia School of Law Professor Elizabeth Burch. She argues that this “oligopoly” exhibits “systemic pathologies” that lead to large fees for plaintiffs attorneys but minimal payouts to plaintiffs. They make millions signing off on a settlement that the defendant and the government possibly could have negotiated without them.
As Judge Polster noted, the process could and should be handled by the legislative and executive branches of government, but, if it were, there'd be no big payday for Paul Hanly, Jayne Conroy, and the other pathological oligopolists in the elite MDL club.

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Opioid Litigation: Court Asks US FDA To Attend Education Session

Jan 30, 2018 | Pink Sheet

By Brenda Sandburg

Judge overseeing multidistrict litigation convenes meeting with senior pharma executives, government plaintiffs and others to learn about supply-chain dynamics and other issues to resolve more than 200 suits.
The remainder of this article is under paywall at: https://pink.pharmaintelligence.informa.com/PS122411/Opioid-Litigation-Court-Asks-US-FDA-To-Attend-Education-Session

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President Trump SOTU

Trump Spent 49 Seconds Of SOTU On Opioid Crisis That Claimed 64,000 Lives In A Year

Jan 30, 2018 | Huffington Post

By Jason Cherkis & Nick Wing

President Donald Trump briefly mentioned the opioid epidemic during his State of the Union speech on Tuesday night, suggesting he’d address the matter through immigration reform and tougher drug enforcement.
“We must get much tougher on drug dealers and pushers if we are going to succeed in stopping this scourge,” Trump said. “My administration is committed to fighting the drug epidemic and helping get treatment for those in need, for those who have been so terribly hurt. The struggle will be long and it will be difficult ― but, as Americans always do, in the end, we will succeed, we will prevail.”
During his speech, Trump also paused for applause for one of his guests, Ryan Holets, an Albuquerque, New Mexico, police officer who, along with this wife, adopted a baby from a pregnant homeless mother struggling with opioid addiction. Their baby girl, Hope, now 3 months old, was also in attendance.
Trump’s rhetoric echoed his comments from the earliest days of his presidential campaign in 2015 when he visited places hit hard by the opioid crisis. Despite his tough talk, Trump has taken little action to address the epidemic as president, and it has showed no sign of slowing since he took office.
Rob Jarvis, a Democratic candidate running for congress in Ohio, a state ravaged by opioids, timed how long Trump spent on the crisis in tonight’s speech. “We got about 49 seconds,” he reported to HuffPost. And most of what Trump said, he noted, was fear-based.
“Where was the plan to actually improve the treatment?” he wondered. Or the plan to address the drug companies who helped spur the epidemic through their prescription painkillers. “Should I be happy that he mentioned it? Or should I be upset that he has no plan?” Jarvis said. He decided he was upset.
“I think it’s on the back burner,” Jarvis said. He added that residents in his district have all but given up hope of an adequate response from Trump. “I think the best word is despondent,” he said. “The idea of hope right now in our region of the state is not something that people talk about much. Everybody knows somebody that has a substance abuse problem. You are past the point of anger. We feel broken. We feel abandoned.”
Ohio’s overdose deaths spiked in 2017, rising by 41 percent between May 2016 and May 2017. Opioid-related overdoses claimed roughly 64,000 lives in the United States in 2016, helping to drive the average American life expectancy down in back-to-back years for the first time since the 1960s. With the crisis showing no signs of abating in 2017, experts predict it will be the third consecutive year of declining longevity, which hasn’t happened in nearly a century, since the Spanish flu pandemic in 1918.
Critics have seen Trump’s response to the crisis as slow and muddled. Last spring, Trump createdan opioid commission to study the epidemic and make recommendations. Many of its proposals were aimed at organizing a public health response to those suffering from opioid addiction. Trump spent most of the past year unsuccessfully pushing to repeal Obamacare ― which would mean tens of thousands of addicts would have lost access to drug treatment.
The commission’s final report was released in early November. “The time to wait is over. The time for talk is passed,” wrote Chris Christie (R), then the governor of New Jersey and chairman of the commission, in a letter addressed to Trump accompanying the panel’s report. “175 deaths a day can no longer be tolerated. We know that you will not stand by; we believe you will force action.”
The 138-page document outlines dozens of recommendations across a variety of areas, including drug prevention and treatment strategies, law enforcement and education. The report itemizes federal drug control spending by function, and notes that Trump’s proposed 2018 budget would increase funding on interdiction by 10 percent, while cutting prevention spending by 11 percent.
The commission also identifies the White House Office of National Drug Control Policy as a key player in the battle against the opioid epidemic. But it’s not clear the Trump administration agrees. The president has yet to nominate a full-time drug czar to lead the ONDCP, and a 23-year-old former campaign staffer had reportedly been running many of the agency’s operations until earlier this month, when he announced plans to step aside amid scrutiny of his work history and résumé. Trump has also reportedly floated the possibility of slashing ONDCP’s budget by 95 percent and shifting its key responsibilities to other departments.
All of these actions have led to questions about whether the White House is taking the opioid epidemic seriously enough. “I think they have highlighted the issue by appointing a commission and having [the Department of Health and Human Services] issue a health emergency,” said Regina LaBelle, the ONDCP’s chief of staff during President Barack Obama’s administration. “But little of substance has been done on the issue to date.”
Trump formally designated a public health emergency for the crisis in October. The move came two months after his commission recommended he instead declare a full-on national emergency, which would have opened up billions of dollars of funding. The public health emergency fund currently holds only about $57,000, which amounts to 2 cents for each individual in the U.S. struggling with opioid addiction, according to the progressive nonprofit Drug Policy Alliance.
With the White House recently estimating that the true cost of the opioid epidemic topped $500 billion in 2015, critics have accused the administration of dedicating insufficient attention and resources to the crisis. Even during his address on Tuesday, Trump spent far more time discussing other issues, including a handful of crimes committed by undocumented immigrants over the past few years.
“His SOTU remarks ring hollow ― no new proposals, no call for substantial new resources,” said Daniel Raymond, policy director at the Harm Reduction Coalition. “If Trump were running a corporation to end this crisis, shareholders looking for results would be ready to oust him.”
Although Trump’s opioid commission has put forth some positive proposals, they won’t bear results unless the president funds them adequately, said Dr. Yngvild Olsen, medical director of the Institutes for Behavior Resources in Baltimore.
“The resources need to be there to fully implement the good ideas — particularly the ones that focus on expanding access to evidence-based treatment and increasing support for people and families struggling with addiction,” Olsen said. “For this we need more than just the outrage the president expressed in his State of the Union address tonight.”

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Trump seems to see opioid crisis as primarily a law enforcement problem (EDITORIAL)

Jan 31, 2018 | Washington Post

By Paige Winfield Cunningham

Last night, President Trump indicated once again that he views the nation's opioid abuse crisis as more of an issue to be dealt with by law enforcement than by medical professionals.
In his State of the Union address, the president correctly described the toll overdose is taking on the country -- noting deaths from drugs caused 64,000 deaths in 2016 -- and promised to go after the problem in the coming year. But while he mentioned in passing a need for better addiction treatment, Trump offered no new details on that front. He instead emphasized the need for law enforcement to stem the supply and distribution of illegal drugs.
“We must get much tougher on drug dealers and pushers if we are going to succeed in stopping this scourge,” Trump said.
The U.S. drug supply has only gotten bigger and deaths from overdose have steadily increased over the past several decades. But during that period, U.S. officials focused mainly on waging a "war on drugs" that mostly failed. Many experts have always argued the problem of drug addiction has more to do with demand than supply, and it could be better tackled by providing better treatment and support to people struggling with addiction.
But ever since Trump declared opioid abuse a public health emergency last fall, most of the action has been taken by the Department of Justice, not the Department of Health and Human Services. Attorney General Jeff Sessionshas announced several initiatives targeting drug trafficking, announcing in November a new division of the Drug Enforcement Agency to unify trafficking investigations in Kentucky, Tennessee and West Virginia.
Yesterday, Sessions said DEA agents will conduct a “surge” operation over the next 45 days to focus on pharmacies and prescribers who are dispensing unusual or disproportionate amounts of opioids, the Post's Sari Horwitz and Scott Higham report. The agency will check data from about 80 million reports it collects every year from prescription drug manufacturers and distributors.
“My administration is committed to fighting the drug epidemic and helping get treatment for those in need,” the president said in his speech. “The struggle will be long and difficult – but, as Americans always do, we will prevail.”
Now, any increased focus on opioid abuse seems like a good thing considering it's a multi-faceted problem. Pretty much everyone agrees on that. Where advocates have gotten is frustrated is in the lack of much new funding for tackling the epidemic and a dearth of details from HHS on how it might address the issue from a prevention and addiction treatment perspective.
HHS did release a list of actions it says it has taken over the past year to address the crisis, although some of them were before Trump made his emergency declaration. The agency said it has:
--Disbursed more than $800 million in grants, more than any previous year.
--Developed a five-point strategy, encompassing better treatment, prevention, and recovery services; better targeting of overdose-reversing drugs; better data on the epidemic; better research on pain and addiction, and better pain management.
--Approved new Medicaid waivers for two states to expand access to substance-abuse treatment and outlined a streamlined process for more such approvals.
--Started to release monthly provisional data from the CDC on drug overdose deaths, shortening what had been up to a two-year lag.
--Clarified privacy regulations to inform hospitals and doctors they can share information with patients’ families during crisis situations.
--Approvrf through FDA the first monthly formulation of buprenorphine, a key option for medication-assisted treatment of opioid addiction.
Trump didn’t share any further details Tuesday night, instead highlighting a New Mexico family – Ryan and Rebecca Holets -- who adopted a baby born to a woman addicted to heroin.
“Ryan and Rebecca: You embody the goodness of our nation,” Trump said. “Thank you, and congratulations.”
Alex Azar, newly instated HHS secretary, said in a statement last night that Trump deserves "tremendous credit for his leadership" on the opioid issue.
"During his first year in office, President Trump has brought a new level of awareness and commitment to this cause, and I look forward to expanding and enhancing our aggressive approach to this scourge of addiction and overdose," said Azar, who was just sworn in on Monday.
Yet Trump stopped short of asking Congress to appropriate any more funding toward the opioid epidemic, even though Democrats and even some Republicans are pouring on the pressure. Earlier in the day, Sen. Roy Blunt (R-Mo.) urged the president to address the crisis in his speech and stressed the need for certainty on the resources available to fight it.
"We need his leadership, we need to know how many resources we have to spend and get busy trying to make a difference in the lives of people who have been devastated by this epidemic," Blunt said.

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Trump vows to stop 'scourge' of opioid epidemic, calls for crackdown on drug dealers

Jan 31, 2018 | CNBC

By Dan Magnan

Trump: My administration is committed to fighting our drug epidemic 41 Mins Ago | 01:23
President Donald Trump lauded a New Mexico police officer who stopped a pregnant woman from injecting heroin — and then adopted her child — as he called for a crackdown on "drug dealers and pushers" to stem the massive opioid epidemic.
Trump, during a State of the Union address that recognized Officer Ryan Holets sitting in the audience, said reforms pushed by his administration will "support our response to the terrible crisis of opioid and drug addiction."
"In 2016, we lost 64,000 Americans to drug overdoses: 174 deaths per day. Seven per hour. We must get much tougher on drug dealers and pushers if we are going to succeed in stopping this scourge," Trump said. "For those who have been so terribly hurt."
"My administration is committed to fighting the drug epidemic and helping get treatment for those in need. The struggle will be long and difficult — but, as Americans always do, we will prevail."
"As we have seen tonight, the most difficult challenges bring out the best in America," Trump said.
"We see a vivid expression of this truth in the story of the Holets family of New Mexico," the president said.
"Ryan Holets is 27 years old, and an officer with the Albuquerque Police Department. He is here tonight with his wife, Rebecca. Last year, Ryan was on duty when he saw a pregnant, homeless woman preparing to inject heroin. When Ryan told her she was going to harm her unborn child, she began to weep. She told him she did not know where to turn, but badly wanted a safe home for her baby."
"In that moment, Ryan said he felt God speak to him: 'You will do it — because you can.' He heard those words."
"He took out a picture of his wife and their four kids. Then, he went home to tell his wife, Rebecca. In an instant, she agreed to adopt. The Holets named their new daughter Hope."
Trump, speaking directly to the Holets, said, "You embody the goodness of our nation. Thank you, and congratulations."

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Trump: US must get 'much tougher on drug dealers and pushers'

Jan 31, 2018 | The Hill

By Rachel Roubein

President Trump said the country must get “much tougher on drug dealers and pushers” to end the opioid epidemic in his State of the Union address on Tuesday.
Trump also said the pillars of his immigration plan will “support our response to the terrible crisis of opioid and drug addiction."
"Never before has it been like it is now. It is terrible. We have to do something about it,” the president said.
A key element of Trump's plan is building a wall along the southern border. Trump has said a wall would help prevent drugs from entering the U.S.
The president also gave a nod to treatment for addiction.
“My administration is committed to fighting the drug epidemic and helping get treatment for those in need, for those who have been so terribly hurt,” he said.
Advocates for those fighting addiction have said a law enforcement approach isn’t enough. They say combating the increasing rate of opioid deaths needs a comprehensive approach that includes tools to promote prevention, treatment and recovery.
The administration has declared opioids a public health emergency. But some have been critical of that declaration, saying the first three months did not lead to new regulations that could have helped curb the crisis.
The president and first lady Melania Trump invited a guest who has a personal connection to the opioid epidemic to the State of the Union, and he sat next to the first lady.
Police officer Ryan Holets, of Albuquerque, N.M., and his wife adopted a baby from a woman with an opioid addiction.

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Trump focuses on law enforcement in combating opioid abuse

Jan 31, 2018 | Washington Post

By Paige Cunningham

President Trump briefly mentioned the opioid epidemic, but offered few new details about how his administration might tackle the nationwide crisis.
“My administration is committed to fighting the drug epidemic and helping get treatment for those in need,” the president said. “The struggle will be long and difficult – but, as Americans always do, we will prevail.”
In line with his previous tone on opioid abuse, Trump talked about the problem in terms of law enforcement rather than health care He emphasized the need to stem the supply and distribution of illegal drugs, which are flowing into the U.S. at higher rates than ever before.
“We must get much tougher on drug dealers and pushers if we are going to succeed in stopping this scourge,” Trump said.
Last fall, Trump declared opioid abuse a public health emergency, and this month the Department of Health and Human Services renewed the declaration before it was set to expire. Attorney General Jeff Sessions has taken several actions to target drug trafficking, announcing in November a new division of the Drug Enforcement Agency to unify trafficking investigations in Kentucky, Tennessee and West Virginia.
Earlier today, Sessions said DEA agents will conduct a “surge” operation over the next 45 days to focus on pharmacies and prescribers who are dispensing unusual or disproportionate amounts of opioids. The agency will check data from about 80 million reports it collects every year from prescription-drug manufacturers and distributors.
Trump noted the magnitude of the crisis, citing the most recent data that 64,000 people died of drug overdoses in 2016. “174 deaths per day, seven per hour,” he said.
Yet the administration – and Republicans in Congress – have been criticized for not devoting more financial resources toward the effort. While Democrats have pushed for more opioid funding, GOP leaders haven’t responded to their requests and the White House has also stayed quiet on the funding front.
And there have been little to no details publicly released by HHS or the White House’s Office of National Drug Control Policy on how the administration might increase health-care services and supports for Americans struggling with drug addiction.
Trump didn’t share any further details Tuesday night, instead highlighting a New Mexico family – Ryan and Rebecca Holets — who adopted a baby born to a woman addicted to heroin.
“Ryan and Rebecca: You embody the goodness of our nation,” Trump said. “Thank you, and congratulations.”

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Northeast (PA, MA, NY)

Dauphin County commissioners file suit against opioid manufacturers, doctors

Jan 31, 2018 | ABC 27 News (PA)

By Janel Knight

Dauphin County commissioners will file a lawsuit against opioid manufacturers and several doctors for their roles in the deadly and costly epidemic.
Commissioners have hired the law firms of Simmons Hanly Conroy and Young Ricchiuti Caldwell & Heller to handle their case.
The law firms will handle all of the upfront costs and will get paid only if the lawsuit is successful and money is awarded. The county plans to use its share to pay for drug abuse treatment and prevention programs.
The Dauphin County coroner’s office reported more than 100 overdose deaths last year and 85 in 2016. The county spent $19.6 million to help 2,859 people suffering from addiction from June 2016 to July 2017.
The commissioners will announce the lawsuit at their regularly scheduled meeting on Wednesday.

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Dauphin County sues opioid manufacturers

Jan 30, 2018 | PennLive (PA)

By Steve Marroni

With more than 100 overdoses in Dauphin County last year, the county is fighting back against those who make the drugs.
On Wednesday morning, the Dauphin County Commissioners plan to announce the filing of a lawsuit against opioid manufacturers and several doctors accused of aggressively marketing the addictive painkillers.
The county announced in September that it was among the first in the state to retain a law firm to file such a suit. The Young, Ricchiuti, Caldwell & Heller firm from Philadelphia is handling the action on a contingency basis, meaning the firm will fund all of the upfront costs of litigation and only receive payment upon successful resolution, county officials say.
Dauphin County recorded more than 100 overdoses in 2017, which is up from 85 in 2016, and between June 2016 and July, the county spent $19.6 million to help 2,559 people suffering from addiction - an 860 percent increase in treatment costs and more than 400 percent increase in people needing treatment from five years ago.

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Boston May Seek To Sue Pharmaceutical Companies For Opioid Crisis

Jan 31, 2018 | WGBH (MA)

By Brendan Deady & Daniel Medwed

As the opioid epidemic consumes lives, futures and fiscal resources, many municipalities are turning to the courts to try to force pharmaceutical companies to shoulder some of the responsibility.
Audio Link: https://news.wgbh.org/2018/01/30/politics-government/boston-may-seek-sue-pharmaceutical-companies-opioid-crisis
Nearly 200 local governments across the country have filed lawsuits against drug manufacturers, including Greenfield, Mass. The lawsuits allege that these companies knew about the addictive properties of their drugs but withheld this information as they inundated communities with a wide array of opioid-based painkillers. The lawsuits are seeking compensation for families but also for public agencies such as police departments, health centers and first responders, whose budgets are strained by the uptick in emergencies related to drug overdoses.
Last week, Mayor Marty Walsh said he plans to issue a call for proposals to law firms interested in pursuing a case against major pharmaceutical companies. The city has been “collecting relevant information in preparation for potential litigation,” according to a statement released by the mayor’s office last week.
The Walsh administration could have a partner at the state level as well. Attorney General Maura Healey's office is among dozens of other attorneys general that are seeking information from five opioid manufacturers and three distributors to determine whether they misrepresented the dangers of prescription painkillers.
Healey's office already secured a $500,000 settlement from the drug manufacturer Insys Therapeutics Inc. for paying kickbacks to doctors who improperly prescribed its painkiller, which is meant to provide relief for terminal cancer patients. The investigation found that the company tried to market the drug for mild pain relief use, despite the drug being 100 times more potent than heroin.
"The legal theory here is based on deceptive marketing, that the pharmaceutical companies knew about the hazards of Vicodin, Oxycontin and other opioids but nevertheless continued to peddle those drugs to doctors, and therefore deserve to shoulder a large part of the legal responsibility for the rise in opioid addiction," said Daniel Medwed, WGBH News' legal analyst.
Medwed said this legal path does have some precedent, specifically in how states sued tobacco companies.
"Both campaigns share this deceptive marketing strategy that the industry basically put a fraud on consumers," Medwed said.
But Medwed cautioned that local government with limited budgets could be facing a daunting and drawn out battle in the courts.
"A classic defense strategy in cases like this is delay, delay, delay — file a lot of pretrial motions, ask for a lot of pretrial discovery to grind down the less wealthy or under-resourced plaintiffs," said Medwed.

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Lawsuit could grant Onondaga funding to help alleviate opioid crisis

Jan 31, 2018 | The Daily Orange (NY)

By Charlie Sawyer

Legislators and public health experts speculate Onondaga County’s lawsuit against several pharmaceutical companies could earn the county reparations for preventative spending on the opioid crisis.
The Onondaga County Legislature filed a lawsuit last week in federal court against more than 20 pharmaceutical companies for irresponsible marketing practices of opioid drugs to health care providers, alleging that the practices contributed to the nationwide epidemic of opioid addiction. Chief among the grievances is that the companies misled health care providers on the addictive nature of opioid drugs, leading them to believe they were safe to prescribe to patients hoping to manage acute pain in the long term.
David Knapp, a floor leader of the Legislature, said the cost of combating the addiction crisis in Onondaga County is steep both financially and socially.
“It’s literally millions (of dollars), and could even be in the hundred million range,” he said of the annual cost to the county.
Knapp said the legislators were “amazed” at the potential cost, calling the situation “a perfect storm.” He added that the social cost manifests in young people who are initially prescribed opioid drugs to manage pain. Some eventually become addicted to the drugs and start using heroin to avoid withdrawal once their prescriptions run out, he said.
“Profits are one thing, but you’ve got to look at the big picture on some of this stuff before you go out and market it to everybody,” Knapp said. “You can’t just look at the effectiveness of a drug but also what the social implications are.”
Onondaga County also has the highest rate of neonatal abstinence syndrome in the state, said Dessa Bergen-Cico, an associate professor of public health and addiction studies in Syracuse University’s David B. Falk College of Sport and Human Dynamics.
“If you look at county and national data, the overdose and death rates keep escalating year after year,” she said. “This past year, the numbers of deaths from opioid overdoses exceeded those attributed to gunfire and auto accidents.”
She added that this case has several parallels with the Tobacco Master Settlement Agreement of 1998. That’s promising because the opioid crisis has yet to reach its peak, she said. After the MSA was implemented, she said, lump sums of money were awarded to the counties and states named as plaintiffs, and health departments could apply for a given amount of money according to population and need.
Winning reparations from pharmaceutical companies could help mitigate the costs of providing treatment and emergency services, Bergen-Cico said. That money, she said, could be allocated to the opioid task force that meets bimonthly and has started to meet on the SU campus to accommodate an influx of members. For Onondaga County, Knapp said these services could include 911 operation and corrections office services, among others.
The roots of the opioid crisis can be traced back to the 1990s, when pharmaceutical companies started to push pain as the fifth vital sign, Bergen-Cico said. Pain’s new status as a fifth vital sign meant it was assessed with the same attention as blood pressure, pulse, temperature and respiration.
Lisa Olson-Gugerty, an associate teaching professor of public health at Falk and a family nurse practitioner in emergency medicine, said the marketing push by pharmaceutical companies was a response to growing demand by patients that health care providers use narcotics to help manage acute pain.
New York state passed a law in 2016 that prevents providers from prescribing more than a week’s supply of opioids to patients, said Olson-Gugerty, who’s prescribed opioids only three times in the past year, she said.
The best-case scenario, Knapp said, would be pharmaceutical companies paying reparations to the county to offset its share of Medicare and Medicaid in acknowledgment of their contributions to the opioid crisis.
“The county picks up half of the state share of Medicaid, and that alone is $100 million,” Knapp said. “And not all of that is for opioid abuse, but a good share of it is.”
Knapp added that while the suit could take several years, the cost to taxpayers will be minimal, since the lawyers will be paid on a contingency basis, meaning they’ll be paid from potential winnings from the judgement.
Olson-Gugerty said if the suit is successful, health care providers should advocate for the removal of pain as the fifth vital sign, which would address a cultural norm that harms health care providers and patients alike.
“We’re responding to the public’s request to address, specifically and directly, the vital sign that was named incorrectly as pain.” she said. “A vital sign is measurable. Pain is not. Pain is subjective.”

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At least 14 NY counties and NYC suing opioid companies

Jan 31, 2018 | Press Connects (NY)

By Hannah Schwarz

At least 14 counties across New York are suing pharmaceutical companies for what they're claiming are deceptive marketing practices meant to minimize the addiction risks associated with opioids.
On Jan. 24, Ithaca became one of the first cities in New York to file a similar suit, just a day after New York City filed its own.
The practice, detailed in one part of a multi-part USA Today Network series, is spreading across New York and the country, with at least 14 states suing opioid manufacturers, according to data from governing.com. A large number of counties in Kentucky, Ohio and West Virginia are filing suits separate from their states.
In September 2017, a bipartisan coalition of 41 state attorneys general said they were filing subpoenas to look into how opioid manufacturers marketed and distributed their products.
In New York, Suffolk was the first county to file suit. All other counties and cities filing have been ordered to coordinate their suits via a Suffolk County judge, said Joe Ciaccio, associate with Napoli Shkolnik, a New York-based law firm representing counties across the state and nation.
Broome County filed its suit Feb. 1 of last year, alleging in its complaint that opioid manufacturers knew about the addictive risks of their drugs, and despite this, "in order to expand the market for opioids and realize blockbuster profits," launched a "coordinated, sophisticated and highly deceptive marketing campaign that began in the late 1990s, became more aggressive in or about 2006, and continues to the present."
The Steuben County Legislature in November gave the county attorney the power to accept bids for representation in its own case, which the county has not filed yet, according to a search of the New York State Unified Court System database.
On Jan. 5, Tompkins County filed its suit. The introduction to the suit begins, "This case is about one thing: corporate greed. Defendants put their desire for profits above the health and well-being of Tompkins County consumers at the cost of the plaintiff."
That claim — that pharmaceutical companies' misrepresentation of opioids' risks cost municipalities exorbitant amounts of money, in the form of emergency services, medical care, law enforcement and employee health coverage — is the basis of all these suits.
It mirrors the claims made by attorneys general in the late 1990s, when states sued tobacco companies en masse.
Those cases ended in 1998 with the Tobacco Master Settlement Agreement, in which companies agreed to pay at least $206 billion to states for the first 25 years of the agreement.
Chemung — which, as of 2016, was the New York county with the highest opioid prescription rate, according to data from the Centers for Disease Control — has not filed suit.
Here are the counties and municipalities suing opioid manufacturers: Suffolk, Dutchess, Broome, Erie, Orange, Oswego, Seneca, Sullivan, Nassau, Schenectady, Schoharie, Rensselaer, Niagara, Tompkins, City of Ithaca, New York City.

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Midwest (IN, OH)

Logansport officials consider joining class-action suit against opioid manufacturers, distributors

Jan 31, 2018 | Pharos Tribune (IN)

By Mitchell Kirk

Logansport officials are considering joining over 15 governments across Indiana in a lawsuit against over 20 pharmaceutical companies seeking compensation for the nation's opioid epidemic.
Opioids are powerful painkillers that can be highly addictive and come in both prescription form, like OxyContin, and illegal form, like heroin.
City leaders discussed joining the lawsuit at a city council finance committee meeting Monday night, Jan. 29. There, Logansport Mayor Dave Kitchell said Bose McKinney & Evans' Indianapolis office would represent the city in the class-action lawsuit, should the council agree to join.
Kitchell said the city wouldn't have to pay the firm unless it was successful in the suit. If the firm is successful, the city would not pay more than it would receive, Kitchell added.
"So you can't lose by moving forward with this," he said.
Lynn Toops, an attorney with Indianapolis-based Cohen & Malad, said by phone Tuesday that the firm is working with Bose McKinney & Evans on the class-action lawsuit. Cohen & Malad has filed complaints for 13 governments from cities and counties across Indiana, she said, adding it's been publicly announced that the firm has been retained by four more. The firm is close to being retained by even more governments, Toops continued, but details cannot yet publicly be disclosed.
The complaint Cohen & Malad filed on behalf of Indianapolis and Marion County accuses the opioid manufacturers and distributors listed among the defendants of using a "deceptive marketing campaign" that's led to a "dramatic increase in the use of prescription opioid pain medications." The "economic damages were foreseeable," the complaint continues, adding Indianapolis and Marion County "spend millions of dollars each year to provide" services for those affected by the nation's opioid epidemic.
The complaint also refers to an October 2017 statistic from the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention indicating 91 Americans die every day from an opioid overdose. It goes on to refer to an October 2017 National Institute on Drug Abuse article reporting nearly 80 percent of Americans using heroin reported misusing prescription opioids first.
The complaint asks the defendants to compensate Indianapolis and Marion County "for past and future costs to abate the ongoing public nuisance caused by the opioid epidemic."
Toops said a court based in Cleveland is responsible for hearing all of the federal lawsuits filed against opioid manufacturers and distributors.
Logansport City Councilman Matt Meagher asked police personnel at Monday's meeting to speak to the effect prescription opioids have had on crime in Logansport.
Assistant Police Chief Dan Frye, who formerly worked with the Cass County Drug Task Force, described the effect as significant.
"It has a negative impact on the police department, the community, the whole nine yards," he said. "...I know we spend countless hours chasing heroin dealers, heroin users."
Frye said the task force is made up of two Logansport Police Department officers and one Cass County Sheriff's deputy. That "is not sufficient manpower" to fight drug crimes in the area, he continued, adding officers with the LPD's patrol and investigative divisions often work overtime to help the drug task force.
Logansport Clerk-treasurer Stacy Cox said the two LPD officers on the drug task force "consistently have overtime because of the type of work and amount of time they have to devote to a case."
Dan Fagan, a patrolman with the LPD, said the effect of opioids expand further than just drug crimes, explaining it drives addicts to steal so they can afford their next fix while creating problems in their home lives, when Child Protective Services has to step in for the sake of addicts' children.
"It's like a snowball rolling down a hill," Fagan said of the impact of opioids.
Meagher asked that any money Logansport would receive from the lawsuit be allocated to the drug task force.
Cass County Coroner Randy Rozzi recently reported there were 10 drug overdose deaths in 2017, all of which were related to opiates or methamphetamine. That's up from the seven drug overdose deaths in 2016.
The rate of emergency room visits where an opioid overdose victim didn't die tripled in Cass County between 2011 and 2015, according to the Indiana State Department of Health.
Logansport City Council will vote on joining the class-action lawsuit at its next meeting at 6:30 p.m. Monday, Feb. 5 in the Council Chambers on the third floor of the City Building, 601 E. Broadway.
Kitchell said a representative of Bose McKinney & Evans will be at the meeting to answer questions.

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Howard County files lawsuit against major opioid distributors, manufacturers

Jan 30, 2018 | Kokomo Tribune (IN)

By Tim Bath

Howard County has filed a civil lawsuit against opioid manufacturers and distributors, alleging they are to blame for the deadly, ongoing drug crisis on a national, state and local level.
In November, the Howard County Board of Commissioners announced its intention to join numerous government agencies across the United States, including the city of Kokomo, in filing suit against drug distributors. The county partnered with Indianapolis-based law firm Taft, Stettinius & Hollister in filing the suit.
A 165-page document outlining the county’s complaint details the alleged negligent actions of three major drug distributors, AmerisourceBergen Drug Corp., Cardinal Health Inc. and McKesson Corp. Those companies account for 85 percent of the prescription opioid market. About 20 other smaller companies are also named in the lawsuit as defendants.
Predominantly, the document provides an outline on the national level of how the actions of these corporations allegedly plunged the nation into a crisis that has been referenced by President Donald Trump, Indiana Gov. Eric Holcomb and has echoed through numerous local meeting rooms and council chambers.
Through misinformation on the addictive nature of opioid medications, the county claims the public wasn’t adequately educated on the dangers associated with taking drugs.
The document, filed in the United States Court Southern District of Indiana, indicates drug development and sales corporation Endo Health Solutions, which is named in the lawsuit, allegedly distributed a pamphlet stating, “Most health care providers who treat people with pain agree that most people do not develop addiction problems.”
Elsewhere, the document claims a patient brochure for an opioid-based medication stated, “Over time, your body may become tolerant of your current dose. You may require a dose adjustment to get the right amount of pain relief. This is not addiction.”
Many other advertising methods that played down the dangers of addiction were also noted in the document. These claims by companies were not based on longstanding scientific evidence, according to the county.
Additionally, the lawsuit claims these companies did not follow protocol to report and investigate suspicious orders – orders the companies should have known would be damaging and contributing to addiction and possible overdoses.
“Opioids are now the most prescribed class of drugs. Globally, opioid sales generated $11 billion in revenue for drug companies in 2010 alone; sales in the United States have exceeded $8 billion in revenue annually since 2009,” states the lawsuit, claiming that companies efforts to minimize actual risk have been “wildly successful.”
The document states that when individuals hooked on painkillers can no longer afford to purchase pills, they have been proven to turn toward non-prescription drugs like heroin.
A similar phenomenon was experienced locally after local and federal law enforcement raided the two Wagoner Clinics for illegal prescription methods. The fallout of the clinics’ closure has been cited as a contributing cause to the local rise of illicit drugs and opioid crisis, as addicted customers of the Wagoners hit the streets looking for a high.
Howard County claims in the lawsuit the companies’ misconduct has had national consequences sparking countless crises in communities, Kokomo and Howard County being no exception. The complaint seeks any available relief from damages deemed proper by the court.
The lawsuit comes after the close of the deadliest year for overdoses in Howard County history, with Coroner Steve Seele saying 44 people died. 2015 held the previous record at 34. The 2017 figures are also a major jump from 2016, when 24 overdose deaths were recorded.
Despite those figures, Seele said in a report that efforts have been focused locally to find some relief in the midst of crisis.
“Even though we have seen a record number of overdose deaths across the nation and locally, I am encouraged with the steps that are taking place at the national and state level to address this crisis,” he said.
“Locally, there have been great strides made over the past several months with the development of the Systems of Care since the drug summit that took place in September of 2017 in Kokomo.”
On Nov. 16, local leaders and community members gathered at Inventrek Technology Park to hear Howard County Commissioner Paul Wyman roll out plans to incorporate multifaceted Systems of Care to combat opioid addiction and substance abuse in local communities.
The event followed up on an opioid summit hosted by Wyman on Sept. 18.
In the following weeks, around 100 people representing major institutions across the community created in-depth plans for five distinct subgroups. Each subgroup is represented by a contingent of volunteers tasked with completing a list of long- and short-term goals.
Those groups include mental health and addiction, community support and engagement, prevention and more.
Later on in November, Wyman spoke on the lawsuit, which had not been filed at that time.
“The important thing regarding this type of a lawsuit is to understand we will never litigate our way out of this situation that we’re in. That’s certainly not what we’re suggesting by any manner by participating in the lawsuit,” he said.
He added, though, that there appear to be “egregious lapses in performance by these organizations. If that pans out to be true, it has certainly contributed to the epidemic that’s before us.”

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Commissioners preparing to file opioid lawsuit

Jan 31, 2018 | The Advertiser Tribune (OH)

By Jimmy Flint

Seneca County commissioners announced Tuesday morning they are to file a lawsuit they hope will help in the fight against the opioid epidemic.
According to a county release, the board, the county’s opiate addiction taskforce and Seneca County Sheriff’s Office are filing a public nuisance civil lawsuit against the five largest manufacturers of prescription opioids and the nation’s three largest wholesale drug distributors.
The lawsuit is in response to manufacturers pushing highly addictive and dangerous opioids, falsely representing to doctors that patients would rarely succumb to drug addiction, according to the release. It also is in response to distributors breaching their legal duties to monitor, detect, investigate, refuse and report suspicious orders of the drugs.
“We are taking this action today because the costs of this opioid crisis have overwhelmed our ability to provide for the health and safety of our residents,” Commissioner Holly Stacy said in the release. “Homes have been broken and families torn apart by this epidemic, which has claimed victims from all walks of life.”
According to the Ohio Department of Health, unintentional drug overdoses caused the deaths of 4,050 Ohioans in 2016, an increase of 32.8 percent compared to 2015.
County organizations, including the sheriff’s office, are attempting to provide specialized addiction services to combat the problem.
“We are attempting to provide a path towards rehabilitation,” Sheriff Bill Eckelberry said.
In other business, commissioners heard about healthcare from Melissa Bodey, a representative of the County Commissioners Association of Ohio.
Bodey was joined by Cindy McCarty, an account manager for Anthem Blue Cross and Blue Shield, to discuss County Employee Benefits Consortium of Ohio.
Bodey said every three years, CEBCO shops for a new provider, and she said Anthem has won the contract for several years.
McCarty said she wanted to discuss important Anthem initiatives.
She said about 99.5 percent of claims made are in network.
“A very small portion of claims are out-of-network. This is better for your members,” she said.
McCarty said Anthem has several objectives to achieve to help decrease prices for counties and their employees.
“Being a good healthcare consumer is a tough concept,” she said. “Anthem’s goal is to control the cost of care, to help the county and CEBCO to control costs as much as we possibly can.”
McCarty said the company has nurses who help consumers better understand healthcare. She also said Anthem sometimes notifies members if they can save money by having a procedure at a different facility.
McCarty stressed the importance of going to a primary-care physician as a “quarterback” to make decisions about a patient’s care. She said for the past five years, Anthem has invested in value-based contracts made with primary-care physicians.
“They are the most affordable and are the quarterback,” she said. “The goal is for everyone to have a primary-care physician, ideally one participating in this program.”
She said there are 30 physicians in the program within 25 miles of Tiffin and 294 within 50 miles of the city.
In other news, commissioners approved a $163,000 safety and technology grant that is to be of no cost to the county.
County Administrator Stacy Wilson said the funding is to provide equipment for the county, the city of Tiffin and the villages of Attica, Bettsville, Bloomville, Green Springs, New Riegel and Republic.
The equipment includes new computers for sheriff’s office vehicles, network servers and video conference equipment.
During new business, commissioners approved:
• A $650,000 appropriation adjustment within the Capital Projects Fund.
• A $190 supplemental appropriation to the General Fund.
• A $3,000 supplemental appropriation to the Delinquent Care and Custody Fund.
• A $1,600 supplemental appropriation to the Probate Court Conduct of Business Fund.
• A $38,000 supplemental appropriation to the Capital Projects Fund.
• A $1,500 supplemental appropriation to the General Fund.
• A contract with Crawford County for the receipt, custody and care of Crawford County juveniles in the Seneca County Youth Center.
• The resignation of Gary Amlin as intermittent paramedic for Seneca County EMS.
• An agreement with H&H Land Clearing for the Jack Stearns No. 2473 Drainage Improvement Project with Hancock and Wood counties.

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Franklin County officially sues opioid makers, distributors

Jan 30, 2018 | The Columbus Dispatch (OH)

By Kimball Perry

Franklin County officially joined a national lawsuit Tuesday that accuses prescription opioid makers and distributors of being a public nuisance by improperly fueling the national epidemic of opioid addiction and overdose deaths.
The suit accuses dozens of opioid manufacturers and distributors, including Dublin-based Cardinal Health, of being hazards to public health by flooding the market with painkillers and other opioids that have fueled the deadly epidemic. They are accused of “false, deceptive, and unfair marketing of opioids.” Those manufacturers and distributors in the other lawsuits filed against them by governments insist they have done nothing illegal.
The suit filed Tuesday in federal court in Columbus is the latest of about 200 filed by governments across the country. The cases have been consolidated and are being heard by a federal court judge in Cleveland.
U.S. District Court Judge Dan Polster has told both sides that he doesn’t want the suits to be about blame, but how communities can deal with opioid addiction and its related health, emergency medical, law-enforcement, treatment and other issues now and in the future.
Franklin County is expected to play a significant role in the suit because, as the largest county in Ohio with a large, established health-care and treatment system, it will be active in any plan to deal with the opioid crisis.
“From 2000 to 2015, Ohio’s death rate due to unintentional drug poisonings increased 642 percent, driven largely by opioid-related overdoses,” the suit alleges.
Franklin County commissioners adopted an Opiate Action Plan last year to deal with the epidemic. It plans to spend $6 million of its money plus $20 million from the county’s Alcohol, Drug and Mental Health Board to fight opioid addiction.

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Seneca County joins lawsuit against opioid producers

Jan 30, 2018 | WTOL (OH)

By Jonathan Monk

A local county has taken a step in a national legal battle against the opioid epidemic.
Seneca County commissioners voted Tuesday to approve the county's partnership with a national lawsuit against opiate manufacturers.
The suit is against five of the largest opiate manufacturers and three of the largest wholesalers in the U.S.
The hope is the county would ultimately get payback for any financial impact the county has accrued in fighting the drug battle.
"Like all of our neighboring counties and others across the nation felt of the cost for security and for services that come as a result of what the opiate epidemic has brought to us," Seneca County Commissioner Holly Stacy said. "We get faced with that against our budget. So we felt, why not join the national effort."
Since 2015, the county has had a county wide opiate task-force that has worked towards finding a local solution to the addictive drugs.
The entry into the lawsuit will show solidarity with neighboring counties, and show residents that they are working towards a positive outcome.
"All lives across the county have been impacted one way or the other," Commissioner Stacy explained. "So, we thought this no cost option to join this national effort was very important, and it was a way we felt we cold be trying to do more for the citizens of Seneca County."
Commissioner Stacy hopes that this announcement not only furthers the ongoing awareness of the opiate epidemic in our region, but will also hold accountable those companies that manufacture opiates wholesale.

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West (CO)

Colorado county blames drug firms for opioid epidemic in lawsuit

Jan 30, 2018 | Associated Press

By Staff

A Colorado county has filed a lawsuit against big pharmaceutical companies, blaming them for the statewide opioid overdoes epidemic.
The Pueblo Chieftain reports the lawsuit, filed Sunday by Huerfano County, alleges the companies "falsely trivialized or failed to disclose the known risks of long-term opioid use."
The county seeks money from the companies as compensation for costs of public services the county otherwise would have not incurred. The lawsuit claims "past economic damages exceeding $750,000" and contends future damages exceeding $1.5 million will occur, but does not appear to explain how those amounts were calculated.
The lawsuit seeks a court order against the companies to stop making "any further false or misleading statements."
Among the defendants are Johnson & Johnson, McKesson Corp., Janssen Pharmaceuticals and Purdue Frederick company.

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Small Colorado County Sues Pharmaceutical Giants

Jan 30, 2018 | Northern Colorado Public Radio (CO)

By Stephanie Daniel

Huerfano County in southern Colorado is suing a long list of the nation’s top pharmaceutical companies. The lawsuit claims residents of the county were led to believe opioids, like oxycodone and Percocet, were safe. Instead, the drugs were highly addictive and, in some cases, led to overdoses and deaths.
John Galusha, Huerfano County administrator, said the lawsuit aims to recoup some of the costs associated with responding to the opioid epidemic such as health care, law enforcement and social services. Galusha said about one in ten people – in the county of 6,700 – have been affected by opioids.
“Ten percent doesn’t seem like a lot but when you’re talking 600 people out of 6,700 people,” he said. “That’s probably a significant piece of our workforce.”
The suit was filed in U.S. District Court in Denver on Jan. 28 by lawyers from California and Colorado. Huerfano County is seeking at least $750,000 in economic damages and $1.5 million in future damages.
Galusha said Colorado Springs-based Attorney Stephen Ochs approached the county commissioners a month ago to gauge their interest in pursuing legal action.
“He showed that there was significant impact to our financial resources and the commissioners agreed and said they would participate,” he said.
Huerfano is the first county in Colorado to file a suit against pharmaceutical companies and distributors for their potential role in the opioid epidemic. Named businesses include Purdue Pharma, the manufacturer of OxyContin, Johnson & Johnson and TEVA Pharmaceuticals USA. Many other cities and states including New York, Seattle and Ohio have filed similar lawsuits against the pharmaceutical industry.

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Southeast (NC)

Orange County joins growing push to make drug companies pay for opioid crisis

Jan 30, 2018 | The Herald Sun (NC)

By Tammy Grub

Orange County will join over 200 governments nationwide, including 15 in North Carolina, suing drug makers and distributors over the opioid crisis.
Drug overdose is now the leading cause of death for Americans under age 50.
Nationwide, more than 64,000 people died from opioid poisoning in 2016. In North Carolina, there were 1,518 deaths – 90 percent more than in 1999. Half died from commonly prescribed medications, state reports show.
The result also has been an increased public cost to provide medical care for addicts and opioid-addicted babies, welfare and protective services for children with opioid-addicted parents, and front-line law enforcement and public safety services, attorney Amy Quezon told the Orange County Board of Commissioners.
Opioid manufacturers and distributors bear some responsibility for those costs, which have hit Appalachian and rural, Southern communities especially hard, said Quezon, with McHugh Fuller Law Group, part of a consortium of national law firms behind the lawsuits.
The Orange County Board of Commissioners also think the companies should bear some responsibility, Chairman Mark Dorosin said after last week’s vote.
“I think the commissioners were concerned about the issue of opioid abuse and substance abuse in Orange County,” Dorosin said. “It’s a growing problem that we’ve seen that has impacts for our Department of Health, our Department of Social Services, the sheriff’s department, the jail, the courts – all of which impose significant costs on the county, and on the residents and the families that are impacted.”
Multiple lawsuits have been consolidated into one for the purpose of deciding whether the three biggest opioid distributors – Cardinal Health, AmerisourceBergen and McKesson Corp. – were negligent, engaged in racketeering and created a public nuisance by not working to curb opioid abuse.
Those companies own 85 percent of the market share and generate a total of over $300 billion in annual revenues.
“They were in the best position to know how many pills were being funneled and flooding really into our cities and into our counties,” Quezon said, “and under the Controlled Substances Act, they had a duty that if they had suspicious orders that they were immediately to stop the shipment and to alert the DEA of the suspicious orders, such that unethical doctors, these pill mills, black market pills that were being sold could be investigated and stopped.
“What we found is that they simply did not alert the DEA (about) any suspicious orders for year, after year, after year, and now here we are,” she said.
The lawsuit also targets opioid manufacturers Purdue Pharma, Teva Pharmaceuticals, Janssen Pharmaceuticals, Endo Health Solutions, Cephalon and Allergan, in particular for a widespread “chargeback” system that gave their distributors a substantial rebate in return for customer sales information. That data should have alerted manufacturers to suspicious orders, the attorneys alleged.
The manufacturers also are accused of advertising opioids as a safe substitute for non-addictive pain medications and downplaying the risks to grow public demand.
The Centers for Disease Control and Prevention reported in 2016 that roughly 42.1 opioid prescriptions were dispensed per 100 people in Orange County; 43.4 prescriptions in Chatham County; and 49.1 prescriptions in Durham County. The national average was 66.5 prescriptions per 100 people.
However, those numbers and the number of deaths from natural or semi-synthetic opioids, such as hydrocodone, had fallen or leveled off from their 2012 peak, suggesting some health-care providers have become “more cautious in their opioid prescribing practices,” CDC officials said.
The opioid companies have denied the claims and asked Ohio U.S. District Court Judge Dan Polster to delay the lawsuit until the Food and Drug Administration releases studies on long-term opioid risks and benefits.
If the lawsuit is successful, state juries will award damages to individual governments. The money could help create a public education campaign about the dangers of pills, support the public response to opioid addiction, and provide treatment for addicts and opioid-addicted babies, Quezon said.

The attorneys will only be paid if there’s a settlement and are working with local governments to determine their opioid-related expenses.

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Commentary and FYIs

Statement from FDA Commissioner Scott Gottlieb, M.D., on new steps to help prevent new addiction, curb abuse and overdose related to opioid products (PRESS RELEASE)

Jan 30, 2018 | FDA

By Dr. Scott Gottlieb

The issue of opioid misuse and abuse remains one of my highest priorities and we believe it’s going to take carefully developed, sustained, and coordinated action by everyone involved to reduce the tide of opioid addiction and death afflicting our communities; while maintaining appropriate prescribing for patients in medical need. We recognize both the urgency and complexity of this crisis and are taking several steps today toward these goals.
Today, at a Part 15 hearing on this issue, we’re gathering a broad group of stakeholders, both private and public, to seek feedback on how the agency can strengthen our oversight of opioids.
I’m encouraged that we have voices representing patients, industry, academia, and advocacy organizations, as well as provider groups and professional societies. I’m deeply committed to helping families, caregivers, and patients grapple with this crisis.
That’s why today we also took a fairly unprecedented and novel action regarding an over-the-counter (OTC) product that we’re concerned is contributing to the death toll associated with the opioid epidemic.
Since establishing the Opioid Policy Steering Committee in May, senior FDA leaders across the agency have been hard at work to ensure that we’re leaving no stone unturned in our efforts to combat this immense public health emergency. With 11.5 million Americans misusing prescription opioids in the past year and more than 40 people dying every day from overdoses involving prescription opioids, it has become abundantly clear that more vigilant action is needed from the FDA and others to get ahead of this crisis.
At the FDA, we believe one of our key roles in addressing the opioid epidemic is to reduce new addiction. We’re exploring ways we can reduce exposure to opioids through our influence on prescribers, particularly through our Risk Evaluation and Mitigation Strategy (REMS) authorities. We’re also actively exploring how we can use changes in packaging as a way to give providers better options for tailoring how much they prescribe to the clinical need. This is especially true when it comes to immediate release formulations of opioid drugs like Vicodin and Percocet, which are typically meant for short-term use.
If more immediate release opioid drugs, in particular, were packaged in three or six-day blister packs; then more doctors may opt for these shorter durations of use. Additionally, provided the FDA concluded that there was sufficient scientific support for these shorter durations of use, this could provide the basis for further regulatory action to drive more appropriate prescribing.
To illustrate the point: Suppose the dental community developed an expert guideline that said that no routine dental procedure should require more than a three or five-day initial fill of an immediate-release opioid, and the FDA reviewed and determined that blister packs in these quantities were necessary to ensure safe use. If the drugs were then packaged in blister packs that comported with these durations of use, it could help reduce overall dispensing. More doctors might more readily opt to prescribe these blister packs instead of other treatment options.
Today, toward these goals, we have taken a new action related to how one opioid product is packaged as a way to help address a growing problem of abuse and misuse of this product. The FDA is requesting that sponsors of OTC loperamide ‒ an FDA-approved product to help control short-term symptoms of diarrhea, including Travelers’ Diarrhea – change the way they label and package these drugs to stem abuse and misuse that leaves us deeply concerned.
Abuse of loperamide has been increasing in the United States. When used at extremely high and dangerous doses, it’s seen by those suffering from opioid addiction as a potential alternative to manage opioid withdrawal symptoms or to achieve euphoric effects of opioid use. The maximum approved daily dose for adults is 8 milligrams per day for OTC use and 16 milligrams per day for prescription use. It’s sold under the OTC brand name Imodium A-D, as store brands, and as generics.
Loperamide is safe at these approved doses. But when higher than recommended doses are taken we’ve received reports of serious heart problems and deaths with loperamide, particularly among people who are intentionally misusing or abusing high doses. The majority of reported serious heart problems occurred in individuals who were intentionally misusing and abusing high doses of loperamide.
The FDA added a warning to the product label in the spring of 2017 to warn of ingesting high doses of loperamide, including from abuse and misuse. Evidence suggests that package limitations and use of unit-dose packaging may reduce medication overdose and death.
Today we sent letters to the OTC manufacturers requesting that they implement changes consisting of packaging limitations and unit-of-dose packaging. We’re requesting that packages contain a limited amount of loperamide appropriate for use for short-term diarrhea according to the product label. One example is a single retail package containing eight 2-milligram capsules in blister packaging. We asked the manufacturers to take the necessary steps to implement these changes in a timely fashion to address these public health concerns.
I also plan to reach out to those who distribute loperamide online, through retail web sites, to ask them to take voluntary steps to help us address this abuse issue. The new packaging should help make limits on sales more easily achieved. The abuse of loperamide requires the purchase of extremely large quantities. Often this is done through the purchase of large bottles of loperamide, which is a common configuration in which the pill form of the medication is currently packaged. Today’s action is intended to change how the product is packaged, to eliminate these large volume containers. We know that many of the bulk purchases of these large volumes are being made online through major online web retailers.
I believe anyone who is distributing health care products has an obligation to be a partner in helping address the most pressing public health challenges like opioid abuse. If you’re selling a drug with the potential for abuse and misuse through an online website, you’re no longer in the business of selling widgets, or books. You have a social contract to take voluntary steps to help address public health challenges.
But this isn’t our only action today. I’m also pleased to announce that we posted the revised and updated Blueprint, “Opioid Analgesic REMS Education Blueprint for Health Care Providers Involved in the Treatment and Monitoring of Patients with Pain,” which contains core educational messages for health care providers involved in the treatment and monitoring of patients with pain. It also includes more information on pain management, including the principles of acute and chronic pain management; non-pharmacologic treatments for pain; and pharmacologic treatments for pain (both non-opioid analgesic and opioid analgesic).
All of these steps are meant to help ensure appropriate use of opioids as they’re intended. But there is much more to do and we are mindful that any intervention the FDA considers should minimize the burden on appropriate patient access and, to the extent practicable, on the delivery system – which brings me back to today’s hearing and why stakeholder feedback is so important.
Engaging with stakeholders is critical to our success. That’s why, following the hearing and discussion today, we welcome and strongly encourage the public to submit electronic or written comments to the docket until March 16, 2018. Many already submitted comments to our previous Federal Register notice, and we’re currently carefully reviewing the more than 900 comments received. We look forward to reviewing the submitted comments from this meeting. Our discussion will also continue on Feb.15 in collaboration with the Duke Margolis Center for Health Policy, through a public workshop disclaimer icon exploring strategies for promoting the safe use and appropriate prescribing of prescription opioids. This feedback, and continued engagement, will inform what more the FDA could be doing to stem the opioid crisis while helping to maintain safe, effective, and appropriate prescribing for patients who need it.
Appropriate prescribing practices, better packaging, and education are important steps within our statutory authority to help address the human and financial toll of opioid addiction. They can reduce harm while still providing effective pain management protocols. Today’s Part 15 hearing, and the new actions I mentioned, are indicative of the kinds of steps we need to take as we confront this epidemic.

The FDA, an agency within the U.S. Department of Health and Human Services, protects the public health by assuring the safety, effectiveness, and security of human and veterinary drugs, vaccines and other biological products for human use, and medical devices. The agency also is responsible for the safety and security of our nation’s food supply, cosmetics, dietary supplements, products that give off electronic radiation, and for regulating tobacco products.

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Racing to replace opioids, biopharma is betting on pain drugs with a checkered past

Jan 31, 2018 | STAT News

By Damian Garde

It was supposed to be a $10 billion idea, one that would help wean the world off its opioid dependence and give the drug industry a bounty of lucrative new products.
But the bottom fell out for a new class of pain medicines, called NGF inhibitors, when patients in clinical trials starting inexplicably blowing out their joints. The Food and Drug Administration put a halt to further studies in 2010, and a bunch of once-transformational drugs suddenly looked like costly scientific mistakes.
Now, after years of research and perseverance, a handful of biopharma companies believe they’ve found a safe way to relieve pain with NGF treatments, pressing through late-stage trials that will determine whether the old drugs can finally pass FDA muster and provide a much-needed alternative to opioids.
“The real question is going to be, at the end of all these Phase 3 studies, is the result going to be positive?” said Dr. David Weinreich, who leads clinical development at Regeneron Pharmaceuticals, which is working on an NGF drug.
Regeneron, which is studying its drug in osteoarthritis and chronic lower back pain, expects to disclose results of a late-stage trial this year. Pfizer and Eli Lilly, which have partnered on an NGF drug, plan to release data in osteoarthritis on the same timetable.
NGF is short for nerve growth factor, which is a free-flowing little peptide that plays a role in the process that lets your brain know you’ve been hurt. NGF flourishes after an injury, binding to pain receptors and helping to transmit distress signals. Blocking it with manmade antibodies seemed like a reasonable way to interrupt the conversation and, as a result, treat chronic pain.
In clinical trials, a regular injection of NGF antibodies easily beat out placebo in reducing pain from osteoarthritis and relieving lower back pain. The treatment from Pfizer and Lilly even bested opioids and medicines from the class that includes Advil. And unlike the painkillers that have contributed to a national public health crisis, NGF drugs don’t seem to be addictive.
In a subset of osteoarthritis patients, however, each therapy led to rapid, dramatic joint deterioration, leaving a small percentage in need of replacement of hips and knees. The FDA convened a panel of independent experts to examine the issue in 2012, and it concluded that NGF drugs were at least somewhat to blame.
In the labs and boardrooms of biopharma, scientists pored over patient data in hopes of ferreting out a way to push forward. What they came up with is fairly simple: NGF drugs aren’t for patients already at risk of joint deterioration and shouldn’t be taken with Advil or other nonsteroidal anti-inflammatory drugs; and patients must be monitored closely to make sure things aren’t going awry.
That was enough to convince the FDA to green-light new studies in 2015. Now, after honing their focus, Regeneron, Pfizer, and Lilly are months away from telling the world whether their dusted-off blockbusters-interrupted can actually become products, focusing first on osteoarthritis and lower back pain.
The trick will be to demonstrate a significant effect on pain without tripping any alarms in joint health. To the FDA, every approval decision is a matter of weighing risks and benefits, and if NGF drugs don’t strike the right balance, it could be 2010 all over again.
Drug companies are optimistic, pointing to FDA Commissioner Scott Gottlieb’s repeated promises to work with industry on advancing new, non-opioid pain treatments. And there’s a perception in biopharma that Gottlieb’s FDA has been more flexible than administrations past, forgiving a few warts on a new drug if the societal need for it is particularly high.
The opioid epidemic, which has seen the rate of fatal overdose nearly triple since 1999, would seem to tick the box of high societal need.
“It’s pretty self-evident, isn’t it, that the opioid crisis is front and center on everyone’s mind in the U.S.?” said Ken Verburg, who leads NGF development at Pfizer. “In that landscape there is a strong need — a desire — for novel, non-addictive, non-opioid analgesic therapies.”
But not everyone believes NGF drugs fit the bill.
Back in 2012, the watchdog group Public Citizen strongly urged the FDA to close the book on the whole class, arguing that its therapeutic potential would never outshine the dangers.
“Obviously, we lost that argument,” said Dr. Michael Carome, director of Public Citizen’s Health Research Group. “But we still think — based upon the evidence we had five years ago — that further pursuit of testing in humans was an unreasonable course of action.”
And on the business side, Leerink analyst Geoffrey Porges has scolded Regeneron for continuing to pour money into the project, warning in 2016 that the company’s NGF drug would be shouldered with “all of the liabilities” of the past and arguing that its continued existence “does not reflect positively” on management.
One NGF contender has already bitten the R&D dust. Invented by Amgen, the drug fulranumab looked just as promising as its peers when Johnson & Johnson paid $50 million for the rights to it in 2008. But J&J walked away from the treatment in 2016, saying its decision had nothing to do with safety concerns. On Tuesday, a spokeswoman for Amgen said the company has no current plans to move the drug forward on its own.
Even if the remaining NGF drugs can finally sway the FDA, commercial success is not guaranteed. Doctors could be wary of prescribing a pain treatment with so many caveats. How can you ensure patients won’t swallow an anodyne little Advil when the pain flares up? And how do you make certain they come in for regular checkups to ensure their hips and knees aren’t going to rot?
“What you don’t want to happen is what happened in 2000,” said Dr. Roneet Lev, director of the emergency medicine department at Scripps Mercy Hospital in San Diego. At the dawn of the opioid epidemic, “it was, ‘Everyone with back pain, everyone with a headache should be on this medicine — it’s safe, it’s good, it’s what you should be on,’” she said.
“As with any drug, you need to look at risks and benefits — and costs,” Lev said.
All of the companies in NGF say it’s too early to talk pricing, but antibody therapies for arthritis can cost more than $24,000 a year. Unless NGF inhibitors are far and away superior to the generic painkillers now commonly used, payers might balk at footing the bill when alternatives cost pennies a day.
As for the drug company scientists, all they can do is run the trials in front of them. And if NGF can hit its first targets, they plan to expand the scope of what they believe could be a treatment for almost any type of pain outside of surgery.
“Until we see the data, nothing’s really off the table,” said Diane Bakaysa, head of pain development at Lilly.

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DEA launches crackdown on pharmacies, over-prescribers

Jan 31, 2018 | The Washington Post

By Sari Horwitz & Scott Higham

Attorney General Jeff Sessions said Tuesday that, over the next 45 days, a "surge" of Drug Enforcement Administration agents and investigators will focus on pharmacies and prescribers who are dispensing unusual or disproportionate amounts of drugs.
To intensify the fight against what is called "prescription drug diversion," the DEA will examine data from approximately 80 million reports it collects every year from prescription drug manufacturers and distributors, Sessions said.

The data include distribution and inventory figures, and analysts will look for patterns and statistical outliers that can be developed into targeting packages, which is information used to identify those suspected of breaking the law, and sent to each of DEA's 22 field divisions, a Justice Department official said.

"That will help us make more arrests, secure more convictions and ultimately help us reduce the number of prescription drugs available for Americans to get addicted to, or overdose from, these dangerous drugs," Sessions said in a speech to law enforcement officials in Louisville

The call for more firepower comes as states and communities grapple with the worst health crisis in modern U.S. history. Prescription drug overdoses have claimed nearly 200,000 lives since 2000, and the death toll continues to rise each year. In October, President Donald Trump declared the opioid epidemic a public health emergency.

A 2016 investigation by The Washington Post found that numerous drug companies and pharmacies have failed to report millions of suspicious orders of narcotics, flooding small towns and large cities with massive amounts of pain pills such as Vicodin and oxycodone. Rogue doctors and pain-pill mills helped to fuel the epidemic.

A separate joint investigation by The Post and "60 Minutes" in October revealed how Congress and the Obama White House approved a law that makes it more difficult for the DEA to bring cases against some of the worst offenders of the nation's Controlled Substances Act. The legislation was backed by some of the biggest names in the pharmaceutical industry.

DEA agents and investigators in the field said the law has made it harder for them to shut down or suspend companies that are failing to comply with the act. Sessions and 44 state attorneys general have called for changes to the law, the Ensuring Patient Access and Effective Drug Enforcement Act.

The amount of prescription narcotics that have wound up with drug dealers and users during the past decade has been staggering. This week, the House Energy and Commerce Committee, which is investigating the opioid industry, said it discovered that two drug-distribution companies had shipped more than 20 million pain pills to two pharmacies four blocks apart in Williamson, W.Va., a town with a population of 2,900.

"These numbers are outrageous, and we will get to the bottom of how this destruction was able to be unleashed across West Virginia," the chairman of the committee, Rep. Greg Walden, R-Ore., and the ranking Democrat, Rep. Frank Pallone of New Jersey said in a joint statement.

Williamson and other communities are fighting back. To date, nearly 270 towns, cities and counties have filed lawsuits against drug distributors, manufacturers and chain drugstores, alleging that they failed to report suspicious orders and phony prescriptions for the drugs. A dozen states have also filed suits, and another group of states has banded together to investigate the industry.

The industry has countered that corrupt doctors and pain-pill mills are mostly to blame for the epidemic and the DEA has not done enough to combat the epidemic.

Sessions has made several speeches recently about the Justice Department's effort to combat the nation's opioid epidemic. On Monday, he traveled to Pittsburgh to announce that dozens of federal agents and analysts will form a team to disrupt illicit opioid sales online.

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Drug companies submerged WV in opioids: One town of 3,000 got 21 million pills

Jan 30, 2018 | ArsTechnica

By Beth Mole

Drug companies hosed tiny towns in West Virginia with a deluge of addictive and deadly opioid pills over the last decade, according to an ongoing investigation by the House Energy and Commerce Committee.
For instance, drug companies collectively poured 20.8 million hydrocodone and oxycodone pills into the small city of Williamson, West Virginia, between 2006 and 2016, according to a set of letters the committee released Tuesday. Williamson’s population was just 3,191 in 2010, according to US Census data.
“These numbers are outrageous, and we will get to the bottom of how this destruction was able to be unleashed across West Virginia,” committee Chairman Greg Walden (R-Ore.) and ranking member Frank Pallone Jr. (D-N.J.) said in a joint statement to the Charleston Gazette-Mail.
The nation is currently grappling with an epidemic of opioid addiction and overdose deaths. The Centers for Disease Control and Prevention estimate that, on average, 115 Americans die each day from opioid overdoses. West Virginia currently has the highest rate of drug overdose deaths in the country.
The letters released Tuesday are addressed to two regional drug distributors, Ohio-based Miami-Luken and Illinois-based HD Smith. Both companies have distributed eye-popping numbers of pills to small cities in the state. In the letters, the committee lays out distribution data it has collected and asks questions about the companies’ distribution practices, including why they increased distribution so sharply in some towns and why they didn’t flag suspicious orders.
But Miami-Luken and HD Smith are not the only distributors that have drawn the committee’s attention. The letters are just the latest in the committee’s ongoing probe into what it calls “pill dumping” amid the opioid crisis. Last year, the committee sent similar letters to three other drug companies, asking about their drug distribution in the state. The committee also sent a letter to Miami-Luken asking for information about its distribution practices and orders in West Virginia, among other things.
Miami-Luken followed through by providing some data and requested files, according to the committee. But those new pieces of information “raise a number of additional questions,” according to the committee.Doused with doses
Combining data collected from the Drug Enforcement Administration and Miami-Luken, the House Energy and Commerce Committee dove into the situation in Williamson. Between 2006 and 2016, drug distributors collectively shipped 20.8 million hydrocodone and oxycodone pills to two pharmacies in the small city. Those pharmacies were located roughly four blocks apart from each other, the committee noted. Miami-Luken alone supplied 6.4 million of those pills to just one of the pharmacies between 2008 and 2015. And between 2008 and 2009, the company inexplicably increased the amount of pills it delivered by 350 percent. The committee pressed Miami-Luken to explain how a town of 3,191 people could require such massive supplies and why the increases didn’t raise alarms.
The letter also reveals that in Kermit, West Virginia, a town of just 406 people, the company delivered 6.3 million hydrocodone and oxycodone pills between 2005 and 2011. For just the year of 2008, the numbers work out to Miami-Luken providing 5,624 opioid painkiller pills for every man, woman, and child in the town, the committee notes.
Likewise, Miami-Luken also delivered 4.4 million hydrocodone and oxycodone pills to the 1,394-person town of Oceana, West Virginia, between 2008 and 2015. And in Beckley, West Virginia, the company didn’t hesitate to fulfill a string of orders for tens of thousands of opioid doses placed by one pharmacy in the span of five days.Craving answers
The House committee repeatedly asked if the company thought these orders were appropriate and what limits—if any—it would set on such small towns.
Miami-Luken did not immediately respond to a request for comment from Ars.
The committee had similar questions for HD Smith, who delivered 1.3 million hydrocodone and oxycodone pills to a pharmacy in Kermit—the 406-person town—in 2008.
“If these figures are accurate, HD Smith supplied this pharmacy with nearly five times the amount a rural pharmacy would be expected to receive,” the committee wrote. It noted that the owner of that Kermit pharmacy later spent time in federal prison for violations of the Controlled Substance Act. Still, the committee pressed the question of whether HD Smith thought its distribution practices were appropriate.
“We will continue to investigate these distributors’ shipments of large quantities of powerful opioids across West Virginia, including what seems to be a shocking lack of oversight over their distribution practices,” representatives Walden and Pallone told the Gazette-Mail.
The paper also noted that West Virginia Attorney General Patrick Morrisey was a former lobbyist for a trade group that represented Miami-Luken and other drug companies. In 2016, Morrisey ended several state lawsuits with drug companies, including one with Miami-Luken. The lawsuits, filed by the state’s former attorney general, Darrell McGraw, alleged that the companies flooded the state with opioid painkillers.

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Nation needs leadership to fight rising opioid epidemic (EDITORIAL)

Jan 30, 2018 | Albany Times Union (NY)

By Daniel P. McCoy

This month, the County of Albany filed litigation against five major pharmaceutical companies for their role in helping to create a national opioid crisis. Our lawsuit was joined with about 200 similar lawsuits by other municipalities across the nation. The federal judge overseeing the litigation, Judge Daniel Polster, expressing urgency, has ordered all parties into immediate settlement discussions this week.
"I did a little math, and we're losing more than 50,000 of our citizens every year," the judge said. "About 150 Americans are going to die today, just today, while we're meeting. And my humble opinion is everyone shares some of the responsibility, and no one has done enough about it. Ideally, this should be handled by the legislative and executive branches."
He's absolutely correct. Last year, an expose revealed that as a result of a targeted lobbying effort, Congress weakened the Drug Enforcement Administration's ability to go after the pharmaceutical industry, even as the national opioid crisis continued to rise.
And pharmaceutical companies continue to take advantage of the situation. One veteran DEA agent said drug company executives he interviewed were no different from the heroin and cocaine traffickers he incarcerated — they had the same motive, to make a profit, and the same disregard for the human tragedy their actions caused.
Our lawsuit alleges the industry violated civil racketeering laws by acting like a criminal enterprise through deceptive marketing and by claiming their pain medications were non-addictive, when they knew otherwise.
Already more people have died in the U.S. from overdoses related to prescription opioids than the number of Americans who died in the Vietnam War. Even more have been swept into a cycle of addiction and abuse that will affect them, their families and our communities for a lifetime.
In Albany County, total drug deaths increased by nearly 30 percent from 2010 to 2015. To deal with this crisis, we formed an Opioid Task Force with stakeholders from law enforcement, academia, government, the health and mental community and the community at large; we were one of the first counties in New York to issue a standing order for Naloxone; we launched Project Orange, a partnership with local pharmacies to raise awareness of safe storage and disposal of unused pain medication; we formed a task force focused on the national crisis of children being placed in foster care as a result of parental opioid abuse; and we retained one of the premier law firms in the nation, Motley Rice, that has successfully challenged the tobacco industry, the asbestos industry, BP Oil and Volkswagen among others, to take on the pharmaceutical industry.
So much more, however, needs to be done. Primarily, the federal government must take this national crisis more seriously. Congress must give the DEA the power to regulate the industry effectively. Important leadership positions in the Office of the National Drug Control Policy must be filled with experienced, competent individuals. Just last month we learned the position of deputy drug czar was being filled by a 24-year-old recent college graduate with no relevant experience.
Additionally, it makes no sense that while we are in the midst of this deadly epidemic the Trump administration has proposed slashing federal substance abuse programs as well as Medicaid funding that supports addiction services. Nor does it make sense that the U.S. attorney general appears to be pursuing a new war on marijuana availability in states that have made such use legal. Studies show marijuana availability is linked to lower overdose death rates, reduced use of opioids for chronic pain, and lower rates of opioid addiction. Fighting legalized marijuana use will only distract from the need to focus resources on fighting the opioid epidemic.
Most importantly, we need a strategic national policy and effective national leadership to deal with this crisis.

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Broadcast Media Coverage

News 5 Today 6am

Jan 31, 2018 | KOAA (NBC)

By Colorado Springs, CO

Video Link: http://app.criticalmention.com/app/#clip/view/32357617?token=46fad8c3-4432-4522-8ae6-93ef032f2c5e
Rough Transcript: developing this morning --- huerfanco county is filing a lawsuit against big pharmaceutical companies... blaming them for the statewide opioid epidemic. the county is seeking compensation from the companies... saying there will be "future damages exceeding 1- point-5 million dollars.." to deal with the crisis in the coming years. the county also wants a court order against the companies to stop making "any further false or misleading statements" about opioids.

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WTOL News 11 Daybreak on FOX36

Jan 31, 2018 | WUPW (Fox)

By Toledo, OH

Video Link: http://app.criticalmention.com/app/#clip/view/32357623?token=46fad8c3-4432-4522-8ae6-93ef032f2c5e
Rough Transcript: on the national fight against opioids. seneca county commissioners approved moving forward with a national lawsuit aimed at opiate manufacturers. it's against five of the largest opiate manufacturers and three of the largest wholesalers in the u- s. there's been a taskforce working to find solutions for the epidemic here since 20-15. county leaders hope the suit will reimburse them for any financial impact from fighting the epidemic.

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ABC27 News Daybreak at 6:00A

Jan 31, 2018 | WHTM (ABC)

By Harrisburg, PA

Video Link: http://app.criticalmention.com/app/#clip/view/32357669?token=46fad8c3-4432-4522-8ae6-93ef032f2c5e
Rough Transcript: dauphin county commissioners are set to announce the filing of a lawsuit against opioid manufacturers and doctors.. for their role in the epidemic. ali: the crisis is taking a toll on the county.. and the commissioners want the companies and doctors to pay for it. janel knight is live in -- with more. good morning, janel. janel knight: you can see just how bad the opioid epidemic is in dauphin county by looking at the numbers... more than 100 overdoses deaths last year... and almost 20 million dollars spent to help those suffering from addiction.. up a dramatic 860 percent. the dauphin county commissioners blame opioid manufactures and doctors... they say they aggressively marketed their products to patients... and now they should help pay for the consequences... the commissioners have hired two law firms to file the suit... they will only get paid if the case is successful and money is awarded... the county plans on using the money to pay for drug abuse treatment and prevention programs. dauphin county is not the only county in the mid-state to file a lawsuit against these big companies... york county has also filed a similar suit/

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Bay News 9 Your Overnight News

Jan 31, 2018 | BAY9 (BAY9)

By Tampa, FL

Video Link: http://app.criticalmention.com/app/#clip/view/32357896?token=46fad8c3-4432-4522-8ae6-93ef032f2c5e
Rough Transcript: pasco county is taking new steps to fight the opioid crisis. it could begin to pursue legal action against drug manufacturers or distributors. county commissioners gave the county attorney the go-ahead to retain special council for opioid litigation. the county says there are about 200 similar cases nationwide. sheriff chris nocco says -- specialists would work to determine direct and indirect costs if a lawsuit moved forward. "when you see bills for law enforcement, for fire rescue, for so many different aspects of government, there's a direct correlation from what you're paying to what the opioidepidemic has done in our community." sheriff nocco says there were 122 opioid-related deadly overdoses in pasco last year.

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