Preview Newsletter
Opioid Litigation Daily Media Report - 4/9/18
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As the opioid epidemic rages, the fight against addiction moves to an Ohio courtroom
Apr 7, 2018 | The Washington Post
By Katie Zezima
The opioid epidemic has affected nearly every aspect of life in Vinton County. Teachers buy shoes for students whose addicted parents send them to school in footwear held together with tape. Overdose deaths have surged. Foster care is overwhelmed. The jail is bursting at the seams. -
The Health 202: Why Cleveland is on the front lines of legal battle against opioid makers
Apr 9, 2018 | The Washington Post
By Paige Winfield Cunningham
A federal courthouse in Cleveland has become ground zero in a raging war between the drug industry and communities scourged by mounting overdoses and deaths from opioid abuse. -
Federal Prosecutor Takes On New Case As DOJ Point Person For Opioid Crisis
Apr 9, 2018 | NPR
By Staff
As a federal prosecutor in New York and Virginia, Mary Daly worked narcotics cases involving gangs and international drug traffickers. Now, she's the Justice Department's point person on the biggest drug case of all—the opioid crisis that is killing an average of 115 Americans every day. -
Court rejects Arkansas attorney general's request, won't pull prosecutor from opioid suit
Apr 7, 2018 | Arkansas Online (AR)
By Amanda Claire Cucio
In a unanimous decision Friday, the Arkansas Supreme Court denied the attorney general's demand that a prosecuting attorney drop a lawsuit against opioid-makers that's similar to her own. -
Warren calls for new federal approach to opioid crisis
Apr 6, 2018 | Associated Press
By Steve Leblanc
U.S. Sen. Elizabeth Warren is calling for the federal government to confront the opioid addiction crisis like it ultimately attacked the AIDS epidemic in the 1980s. -
Don’t lecture physicians on ‘cautious prescribing’ of opioids (Opinion)
Apr 9, 2018 | Modern Medicine Network
By Lori Rousche
With the opioid crisis touching almost every life in this country, there are new guidelines for prescribing medications for chronic pain. Every day there is another tragic story concerning this epidemic in the local newspaper. Thousands are dying of overdoses and patients and families incur extensive suffering. -
Pam Bondi says Florida will file opioid lawsuit
Apr 6, 2018 | News Service of Florida (FL)
By Staff
Attorney General Pam Bondi said this week Florida plans to file a lawsuit against drug companies because of the opioid epidemic that has led to overdose deaths across the state. -
Pam Bondi wants to sue drug companies, but she still hasn’t found a lawyer
Apr 9, 2018 | Tampa Bay Times (FL)
By Lawrence Mower
Attorney General Pam Bondi last week that she will sue the big drug makers and distributors who contributed to today's heroin crisis. -
Palm Beach County files 266-page lawsuit against dozens of companies in opioid crisis
Apr 6, 2018 | WPTV (FL)
By Andrew Ruiz
Palm Beach County has filed suit against dozens of companies and firms who it says is responsible for the opioid epidemic impacting our area. -
Florida County Sues Companies For Aiding Opioid Crisis
Apr 6, 2018 | The Daily Caller
By Amber Randall
Palm Beach County in Florida filed a lawsuit Thursday against major corporations alleging some of their business practices led to the rise of the opioid crisis. -
Editorial: Palm Beach County brings stinging case to court on opioids (Opinon)
Apr 8, 2018 | My Palm Beach Post (FL)
By The Editorial Board
“This case is about one thing: corporate greed.” So begins the lawsuit filed by the government of Palm Beach County against the pharmaceutical manufacturers, distributors and sellers behind the opioid crisis that has cost this region so much in lives and money. -
Arkansas Senate: State suing opioid manufacturers
Apr 8, 2018 | Magnolia Reporter (AR)
By Staff
The manufacturers of prescription painkillers are facing a barrage of lawsuits from state and local governments across the United States. -
City of Orangeburg may sue drug companies
Apr 6, 2018 | The T&D (SC)
By Gene Zaleski
The City of Orangeburg is joining a other municipalities across the nation that are considering suing pharmaceutical companies and distributors for costs resulting from the opioid abuse epidemic. -
District attorneys general want Tennessee AG's move to take over opioid lawsuit denied
Apr 7, 2018 | Bristol Herald Courier (VA)
By Lurah Spell
Northeast Tennessee district attorneys general who filed a lawsuit against three major opioid manufacturers want Tennessee Attorney General Herbert Slatery’s motion to take over the case to be denied. -
City ponders opioid lawsuit
Apr 9, 2018 | The Record Delta (WV)
By Katie Kuba
Should Buckhannon City Council vote to join a class action lawsuit that’s being brought against pharmaceutical manufacturers for dumping massive amounts of opioids into the Mountain State? -
County joins national lawsuit
Apr 7, 2018 | Waynesville Daily Guide (MO)
By Staff
The Pulaski County Commission has agreed to join a national lawsuit taking aim at opioid manufacturers, distributors and retailers. -
Vanderburgh Co. Commission files lawsuit against opioid manufacturers, distributors
Apr 6, 2018 | Tristate Homepage (IN)
By Staff
The Vanderburgh County Commission filed a lawsuit on Friday on behalf of the county government against opioid manufacturers and distributors, alleging that they fueled the opioid crisis. -
Vanderburgh County suing drug manufacturers, distributors to recoup costs of opioid crisis
Apr 6, 2018 | Courier & Press (IN)
By Tori Fater
In the midst of an opioid crisis that took dozens of lives in Vanderburgh County last year and matches a national trend of addiction and other health risks, county officials are suing opioid manufacturers and distributors for misrepresenting the risks and uses of the drugs. -
St. Joseph County files lawsuit against opioid manufacturers
Apr 6, 2018 | South Bend Tribune (IN)
By Lincoln Wright
St. Joseph County officially filed its lawsuit against more than 20 manufacturers and distributors of opioid prescriptions. -
Gibbons responds to questions regarding possible opioid lawsuit
Apr 8, 2018 | The Telegraph (IL)
By Scott Cousins
Madison County State’s Attorney Tom Gibbons submitted a series of written answers to questions regarding the possibility of a lawsuit against the opioid industry at a recent Judiciary Committee meeting. -
Local doctors are backing off opioid prescriptions as crisis continues to grow
Apr 9, 2018 | South Bend Tribune (IN)
By Lincoln Wright
Dr. Todd Graham’s murder was a sobering event in the opioid epidemic. The doctor at South Bend Orthopaedics was shot and killed last summer by a patient’s husband for not prescribing opioid pain medication. -
Hudson County sues makers of opioids, alleging negligence and fraud
Apr 6, 2018 | NJ.com (NJ)
By Terrence T. McDonald
Hudson County this week joined the growing list of public entities suing opioid manufacturers, alleging the companies spent decades convincing the public that their drugs are safe and downplaying their addictive nature. -
Hudson County sues makers of opioids, alleging negligence and fraud
Apr 6, 2018 | NBC Connecticut (CT)
By Staff
As the opioid crisis continues to take a grip on cities and towns across the state of Connecticut and other states, the City of New London plans to sue opioid drug manufacturers and distributors. -
City Announces Lawsuit Against Opioid Distributors, Manufacturers
Apr 6, 2018 | New London Patch (CT)
By RJ Scofield
Mayor Michael Passero announced Thursday that the city will file a lawsuit in Connecticut Superior Court to hold opioid drug manufacturers and distributors accountable for the damages incurred by New London in dealing with the opioid epidemic. -
Suing drug companies is a good place to start (Opinion)
Apr 9, 2018 | The Lewiston Tribune (WA)
By Staff
In filing a lawsuit against drug companies over the region's opioid crisis, Clark County officials are rightly standing up for citizens. Evidence suggests that drug-makers have spent years overstating the benefits of painkillers while downplaying the risks, all in the name of profit. -
County weights joining opioid lawsuit
Apr 6, 2018 | Whidbey News-Times (WA)
By Laura Guido
The Board of Island County Commissioners held a round-table discussion Monday to consider whether to join multi-district litigation against prescription opioid manufacturers. -
Good Morning Suncoast at 5:00am
Apr 9, 2018 | Tampa, FL
By WWSB (ABC)
Video Link: https://app.criticalmention.com/app/#clip/view/34120448?token=15c1cbca-eeab-4eb1-a8d7-d8239143bdc6 -
Action News Jax at 8:00
Apr 8, 2018 | Jacksonville, FL
By WJAX (CBS)
Video Link: https://app.criticalmention.com/app/#clip/view/34120753?token=15c1cbca-eeab-4eb1-a8d7-d8239143bdc6 -
ABC 27 News at 6pm
Apr 6, 2018 | Tallahassee, FL
By WTXL (ABC)
Video Link: https://app.criticalmention.com/app/#clip/view/34121062?token=15c1cbca-eeab-4eb1-a8d7-d8239143bdc6 -
FOX 35 NewsEdge at 6pm
Apr 6, 2018 | Orlando, FL
By WOFL (Fox)
Video Link: https://app.criticalmention.com/app/#clip/view/34120950?token=15c1cbca-eeab-4eb1-a8d7-d8239143bdc6 -
Good Day Orlando
Apr 7, 2018 | Gainesville, FL
By WOGX (Fox)
Video Link: https://app.criticalmention.com/app/#clip/view/34120835?token=15c1cbca-eeab-4eb1-a8d7-d8239143bdc6 -
NBC 6 South Florida News at 6pm
Apr 6, 2018 | Miami, FL
By WTJV (NBC)
Video Link: https://app.criticalmention.com/app/#clip/view/34120922?token=15c1cbca-eeab-4eb1-a8d7-d8239143bdc6 -
Eyewitness News at 11pm
Apr 6, 2018 | Orlando, FL
By WFTV (ABC)
Video Link: https://app.criticalmention.com/app/#clip/view/34120886?token=15c1cbca-eeab-4eb1-a8d7-d8239143bdc6 -
WPBF 25 News Mornings
Apr 8, 2018 | West Palm Beach, FL
By WPBF (ABC)
Video Link: https://app.criticalmention.com/app/#clip/view/34120781?token=15c1cbca-eeab-4eb1-a8d7-d8239143bdc6 -
44 News at 6
Apr 6, 2018 | Evansville, IN
By WEVV (CBS)
Video Link: https://app.criticalmention.com/app/#clip/view/34120149?token=15c1cbca-eeab-4eb1-a8d7-d8239143bdc6 -
FOX23 News at 10
Apr 8, 2018 | Tulsa, OK
By KOKI (Fox)
Video Link: https://app.criticalmention.com/app/#clip/view/34120651?token=15c1cbca-eeab-4eb1-a8d7-d8239143bdc6 -
KING 5 News at 11
Apr 7, 2018 | Seattle, WA
By KING (NBC)
Video Link: https://app.criticalmention.com/app/#clip/view/34120847?token=15c1cbca-eeab-4eb1-a8d7-d8239143bdc6 -
KARK 4 News at 10
Apr 6, 2018 | Little Rock, AR
By KARK (NBC)
Video Link: https://app.criticalmention.com/app/#clip/view/34120864?token=15c1cbca-eeab-4eb1-a8d7-d8239143bdc6 -
WJCL 22 News at 11
Apr 6, 2018 | Savannah, GA
By WJCL (ABC)
Video Link: https://app.criticalmention.com/app/#clip/view/34120891?token=15c1cbca-eeab-4eb1-a8d7-d8239143bdc6 -
Western Mass News on ABC40 at 5:30pm
Apr 6, 2018 | Springfield, MA
By WGGB (ABC)
Video Link: https://app.criticalmention.com/app/#clip/view/34121160?token=15c1cbca-eeab-4eb1-a8d7-d8239143bdc6
MDL
Commentary and FYIs
Southeast (FL, SC, AR, TN, WV, MO)
Midwest (IN, IL,)
Northeast (CT, NJ)
Northwest (WA)
Broadcast Media Coverage
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As the opioid epidemic rages, the fight against addiction moves to an Ohio courtroom
Apr 7, 2018 | The Washington Post
By Katie Zezima
The opioid epidemic has affected nearly every aspect of life in Vinton County. Teachers buy shoes for students whose addicted parents send them to school in footwear held together with tape. Overdose deaths have surged. Foster care is overwhelmed. The jail is bursting at the seams.
The expenses related to caring for the children of drug abusers and locking up drug offenders here eat up about 25 percent of the Ohio county’s $4 million annual budget, a hole that it can’t plug. Now, Vinton officials think someone should help foot the bill: Big Pharma.
“It almost feels like Vinton County was preyed upon,” said Lily Niple, who got addicted to prescription opioids here but managed to push through, having been clean for more than two years. “It’s like a huge exploitation of the people here. And it was negligent. Just complete disregard for the future.”
As communities continue to reel and police and emergency responders struggle to keep the addicted alive, the biggest fight against the opioid epidemic is being waged in a federal courthouse in Cleveland, where hundreds of lawsuits brought by cities, counties, Native American tribes and unions have been brought together into one case with a scope that rivals anything seen in the U.S. legal system.
Vinton County and hundreds of other municipalities across the nation are suing companies that manufactured and distributed powerful painkillers and others up and down the supply chain, arguing that they knowingly peddled massive amounts of a highly addictive product that set in motion a public health crisis. The plaintiffs argue that the vast network of opioid businesses should pay for the damage the drugs wrought.
“This is probably the most complex piece of litigation in the history of our country,” said Paul J. Hanly Jr., one of the lead plaintiffs lawyers.
The consolidated case is being compared to the one that led to hundreds of millions of dollars in settlements against tobacco companies and restricted the sale and marketing of cigarettes. Some of the same tobacco lawyers are now working on the opioids trial.
Plaintiffs are making different, but similar, claims and suing various companies in the drug pipeline. Some allege the drug companies created a public nuisance with their products. Others argue that deceptive marketing led to an epidemic. Some say state consumer protection laws were violated. Some of the lawyers allege that the distribution system, which includes wholesalers and distributors of powerful narcotics, amounted to a criminal enterprise. A small group is suing pharmacy benefit managers. Some are suing pharmacies. One lawyer is suing on behalf of children born to mothers who were addicted to opioids.
“We brought suit because we recognized that the companies had to both be held accountable for their long-term marketing practices that really created this market and fostered a misleading attitude toward these drugs as a pain management,” said Edward N. Siskel, the Chicago corporation counsel. “And then to make sure that they reform the industry going forward.”
The Justice Department filed a motion this past week requesting that it be allowed to participate in settlement discussions as a friend of the court. Attorney General Jeff Sessions said the department would seek repayment for the cost of the drug crisis because the federal government has borne substantial expenses.
The sheer number of defendants in the case — more than a dozen — also is staggering and unprecedented. And they could start pointing fingers at one another. They include the manufacturers Purdue Pharma and Janssen Pharmaceuticals, the distributors AmerisourceBergen, McKesson and Cardinal Health and pharmacy benefit managers such as Express Scripts.
Janssen, in a statement, argued that the claims made against the company are “baseless and unsubstantiated” and that its marketing and promotion of the medications were “appropriate and responsible.” Purdue Pharma, in a statement, said it is “deeply troubled” by the opioid crisis and “dedicated to being part of the solution.” Express Scripts said it denies the allegations and “will vigorously defend ourselves.”
The Healthcare Distribution Alliance, a trade group that represents manufacturers and is not involved in the litigation, said it “defies common sense” to think that distributors are responsible for the number of opioid prescriptions written across the country.
“Those bringing lawsuits would be better served addressing the root causes, rather than trying to redirect blame through litigation,” said Senior Vice President John Parker.
The litigation comes as people at all levels of government have identified opioid abuse as a major public health — and societal — woe, one that thus far has defied solution. And in many ways, lawyers and legal experts say, the opioid lawsuit is different and far larger in scope than efforts such as the action against Big Tobacco.
The opioid epidemic kills hundreds of people each day, akin to the 1918 flu pandemic. The judge overseeing the case, Dan Aaron Polster of the Northern District of Ohio, said during a January hearing that this scourge was man-made and that lawyers need to reach a resolution quickly, because approximately 150 people are dying each day.
Greta Johnson, assistant chief of staff to the executive of Summit County, Ohio, said the county has spent nearly $200 million during the past decade trying to keep up with the costs of addiction. That includes a mobile unit for when the morgue is at capacity, as it was five times last year.
“We are literally stacking bodies,” Johnson said. “That was the reason for the lawsuit.”
The crisis also is affecting the national economy, something that could drive a settlement well past record-breaking territory. The White House Counsel of Economic Advisers estimates that the economic cost of the opioid crisis was $504 billion just in 2015, or 2.8 percent of that year’s gross domestic product. Altarum, a nonprofit organization that studies health care, estimates the opioid crisis cost the country more than $1 trillion from 2001 to 2017.
Attorneys argue that some municipalities have spent tens of millions of dollars trying to fight opioid-related concerns. Health-care costs for municipal employees have skyrocketed. Jails are packed. Counties have purchased thousands of doses of a drug used to reverse overdoses, and first responders are working overtime, often reviving the same people over and over again.
Mark Chalos, a lawyer who represents communities in Tennessee and some unions, said the toll is tremendous, “a preventable catastrophe . . . made entirely by an industry that operates in plain view.”
MDLs rare, but increasing
The merged federal case is called multidistrict litigation, or MDL. Lawsuits of its kind are rare — some lawyers admit they don’t even know what they are — but are increasing as the economy nationalizes and courts are being used to solve problems that the government can’t. Other MDLs include litigation surrounding concussions suffered by NFL players, which was settled for about $1 billion, and lawsuits from the BP oil spill that settled for about the same amount. Judge Polster has overseen two other MDL cases, including a settlement over the use of an injectable medical dye.
Judges understand that “the MDL is being entrusted with the most difficult problems of our time,” said Jaime L. Dodge, director of the Institute for Complex Litigation and Mass Claims at the Emory University School of Law. “At some level I think there’s a recognition that in some of these cases it’s not just a dollar or cents, it’s about fixing ongoing societal problems.”
How exactly to fix the problem of opioids is the question that Polster and the hundreds of lawyers are trying to answer. The judge has said that he wants to see a speedy settlement and an end to the suffering. Polster is taking a unique tack — he is not interested in litigation for the sake of litigation. Instead, he wants to help solve the crisis and do something to “dramatically reduce the quantity” of opioids being disseminated, manufactured and distributed, he said in a January hearing. He also wants to ensure the drugs are being used properly.
“My objective is to do something meaningful to abate the crisis and to do it in 2018,” he said.
It is not the first time that some of the companies have been pursued in the courts. In 2003, Hanly sued Purdue Pharma, which makes the powerful synthetic opioid painkiller OxyContin. The company paid out $600 million, and three executives pleaded guilty to criminal charges that they misled doctors, regulators and patients. But the epidemic raged on.
The first lawsuits in the current case were filed in 2014, when Chicago and Orange and Santa Clara counties in California sued the drug industry. The scattershot efforts were consolidated by a judicial panel in December, easing case management and streamlining the effort, allowing, for example, lawyers to depose an executive once for use in all the lawsuits. Some municipalities in the combined case, including Chicago and Montana, were forced into it against their wishes.
Some attorneys general are pursuing separate litigation in state courts. So are some municipalities, including Harris County, Tex., which argues that a local court is the best venue.
Not surprisingly, disagreements about how to proceed have surfaced among plaintiffs. Some would prefer a speedy settlement, while others want to see the cases proceed to court — and a jury.
Polster wrote in public minutes of a closed-door settlement conference meeting last month that the parties “identified barriers to a global resolution.” The lawyers are now working toward a settlement but also pursing the possibility of litigation on another track. They are preparing for discovery and making known which cases they would like to try first. Polster has put attorneys on an aggressive timeline, scheduling another settlement hearing for May.
Because Polster has issued a gag order, lawyers declined to discuss a possible settlement or case strategy. The judge also put a protective order on what lawyers say is likely the linchpin of the case: information from a database kept by the Drug Enforcement Administration that monitors the flow of prescription painkillers from manufacturer to distribution point.
After initially resisting, the DEA said it would disclose some of the data, including identifying the manufacturers and distributors that sold 95 percent of the opioids in each state from 2006 to 2014. Lawyers say the full set of data could provide a road map for the crisis, perhaps showing a correlation between where the drugs flooded and where people died. Congress also is keen on obtaining the database. Polster thus far has sealed any data released to the parties.
The data is confidential, but some information that has been released and analyzed is staggering: In two instances, millions of pills were shipped to pharmacies in tiny West Virginia towns.
A 'party thing' turns to addiction
In Vinton County, where 13,000 people live among the rolling hills and creeks, an average of 113.5 doses of opioids were dispensed per resident here in 2012, according to state data. A sign outside the county’s one pharmacy advertises safe prescription week.
Lily Niple was one of the county residents ensnared in the crisis. She started using pills as a “party thing” on the weekends while she was in college and was waitressing at a bar. She stopped using when she became pregnant, but she started again after her daughter was born three months premature and she was prescribed opioids after a difficult delivery. She continued to use opioids during two subsequent pregnancies and got unexpectedly pregnant a fourth time.
Family members hung a piñata from a tree for her third child’s first birthday party. Driving around alone after the party, she spotted the heavy-duty yellow rope still hanging from the tree, and she contemplated hanging herself from it. But she was pregnant and thought her unborn child deserved to live, so she drove herself to a hospital. She found sobriety, again, but then relapsed after breaking a rib.
She quit drugs for good in 2016, using a long-acting medication designed to wean substance abusers off opioids and an outpatient rehab program she was ordered to attend as a condition of parole after being convicted of theft. She is now raising her children — ages 4, 5, 8 and 11 — and works with others in the county who are addicted.
“I realize I had a unique position to be impactful in my recovery,” she said.
Opioids are taking a large toll on the children in Vinton; in 2016, there were 202 drug-related child protective services investigations, the vast majority of which involved opioids, said Trecia Kimes-Brown, the county prosecutor. A principal said that a 7-year-old sat in her office and described how to properly shoot heroin — something the child learned from watching it happen at home.
Other children are living in households made chaotic by drugs, forcing teachers to become both counselors and educators. Many students live with grandparents because their parents are addicted to drugs. Children’s services workers are suffering from trauma because of the damage they see, and they don’t know what horrors they will encounter with each home visit.
“Our kids are in such survival mode,” said Mary Ann Hale, assistant superintendent for the county schools and principal at West Elementary. “We have to unpack it at the schoolhouse door and pack it back up before we can even get to the three Rs of reading, writing and arithmetic.”
The cost of drug abuse is so straining Vinton that voters enacted levies on property owners to fund services for children and seniors.
“We can’t wait on anybody to fix this for us,” said Jody Walker, executive director of South Central Ohio Job and Family Services.
The county hired a mental-health deputy to work with people with substance-abuse issues and recently obtained a grant for a drug court. It is working on opening recovery housing. Residents are proud to live here, and officials said they are working tirelessly to tackle the problems while being as innovative as they can.
“Imagine what we can do if we had the abatement money from the lawsuit,” Kimes-Brown said.
Until then, there is scant funding. The jail is so crowded with female inmates that the sheriff’s office often has to negotiate delicate swaps: When a woman is arrested, deputies call Kimes-Brown and ask her to release someone to free up a slot. One night, the sheriff’s office called 23 jails in southern Ohio trying to find space for a female arrestee. Walker said the agency has to make difficult choices each day, like whether to spend thousands of dollars to treat bedbugs in the home of parents who are addicted to drugs.
Sheriff Shawn Justice has worked for the department since 1993. Legally prescribed opioids, he said, have led to abuse, which in turn has led to a rash of illegal consequences, including theft and burglary. People steal painkillers from nursing homes or possessions from their parents to fund black-market purchases.
Pills, he said, led to heroin. There’s now an influx of crystal meth, which is causing people to be extremely violent. He is supportive of the lawsuit and wants to see those in the supply chain pay for what opioids did to his county.
“You’ve got to hold them accountable for it,” Justice said.
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The Health 202: Why Cleveland is on the front lines of legal battle against opioid makers
Apr 9, 2018 | The Washington Post
By Paige Winfield Cunningham
A federal courthouse in Cleveland has become ground zero in a raging war between the drug industry and communities scourged by mounting overdoses and deaths from opioid abuse.
The big question in this historic, multijurisdictional lawsuit – in which hundreds of lawsuits from cities, counties, Native American tribes and unions have come together in a single, massive case rivaling anything seen in the U.S. legal system – isn’t really whether the drug industry will get off scot-free. That’s unlikely, legal experts told me, given the scale of the opioid epidemic, which policymakers, law enforcement and the medical community are scrambling to address.
Instead, the outcome to watch is how much these opioid makers and distributors end up paying out in a likely settlement – and whether that will help resolve the crisis that claims the lives of more than 42,000 people every year.
States and local governments suing companies that manufacture and distribute powerful painkillers argue they should be held partly responsible for the public health crisis because of how they marketed their products -- and failed to adequately report their abuse to authorities. They want opioid companies to pay for some of the damage caused by their medications.
Richard Ausness, a professor at the University of Kentucky College of Law who has been closely following the cases, told me the lawsuit will come down to what the drug companies are capable of paying. And even if that looks like a big dollar figure, there’s still no guarantee it will be used effectively or even be enough to put a dent in the sweeping epidemic.
“This is a really complex, long-term problem,” Ausness said. “You’ve got millions of people who are addicted and they’re going to stay addicted for the rest of their lives, in all likelihood. This is a small piece of what should be a much broader approach, and you don’t hear people talking about that.”
Jodi Avergun, a former chief of staff of the Drug Enforcement Administration and now a defense lawyer with Cadwalader, Wickersham and Taft, said she thinks there’s “no question” the lawsuits will end in settlements. Opioid makers and distributors are looking to be “part of the solution” by educating doctors about prescribing, working on abuse-deterrent formulas and changing their advertising approach, she said.
“I think that it’s not a matter of winning and completely being exonerated and having no responsibility,” Avergun said. “It’s a matter of looking for solutions they can be part of but not be held liable for causing the opioid crisis.”
Purdue Pharma, one of more than a dozen defendants in the case, has said it is “deeply troubled” by the crisis and “dedicated to being part of the solution.” But two other companies named in the lawsuits, Janssen Pharmaceuticals and Express Scripts, have denied the allegations against them and promised to vigorously defend themselves.
The consolidated case -- presided over by Judge Dan Aaron Polster of the Northern District of Ohio -- is being compared to the one that led to hundreds of millions of dollars in settlements against tobacco companies and restricted the sale and marketing of cigarettes, my colleague Katie Zezima writes in a fascinating look at the case’s ins and outs and how a particularly affected Ohio county got involved.
It's hard to overstate the complexity of the joined lawsuits, with plaintiffs making different but similar claims and suing various companies in the drug pipeline. (The Health 202 wrote in February about similar cases that dozens of states are pursuing in state courts.) “This is probably the most complex piece of litigation in the history of our country,” Paul Hanly Jr., one of the lead plaintiffs lawyers, said.
“Some allege the drug companies created a public nuisance with their products. Others argue that deceptive marketing led to an epidemic. Some say state consumer protection laws were violated,” Katie writes.
“Some of the lawyers allege that the distribution system, which includes wholesalers and distributors of powerful narcotics, amounted to a criminal enterprise,” she continues. “A small group is suing pharmacy benefit managers. Some are suing pharmacies. One lawyer is suing on behalf of children born to mothers who were addicted to opioids.”
The federal government is getting involved, too. Last week, the Justice Department filed a motionrequesting it be allowed to participate in the settlement discussions as a “friend of the court.” The agency is seeking repayment for the epidemic’s cost because it has posed substantial expense to the U.S. government, according to Attorney General Jeff Sessions. Other members of Trump's administration are also taking action where they can; Surgeon General Jerome Adams issued a rare advisory last week for Americans to get trained in administering the overdose reversal drug naloxone.
But plaintiffs are disagreeing among themselves about how to proceed, Katie reports. While some would prefer a quick settlement, others want to see it proceed to court and a jury. The lawyers are working toward a settlement, but are also pursuing the possibility of litigation on another track.
Polster, who has scheduled the next settlement hearing for May, wants to see a speedy settlement and an end to the suffering. “Polster is taking a unique tack — he is not interested in litigation for the sake of litigation,” Katie writes. “Instead, he wants to help solve the crisis and do something to ‘dramatically reduce the quantity’ of opioids being disseminated, manufactured and distributed, he said in a January hearing.”
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Federal Prosecutor Takes On New Case As DOJ Point Person For Opioid Crisis
Apr 9, 2018 | NPR
By Staff
As a federal prosecutor in New York and Virginia, Mary Daly worked narcotics cases involving gangs and international drug traffickers. Now, she's the Justice Department's point person on the biggest drug case of all—the opioid crisis that is killing an average of 115 Americans every day.
Attorney General Jeff Sessions appointed Daly, 40, to the newly created post of opioid coordinator in February, making her the hub for the Justice Department's efforts to try to get a grip on the epidemic.
"It's a lot different than being in the field," Daly said in an interview with NPR. "But one of the reasons I took the job is I thought it was an opportunity to help with this problem on a larger scale than I was as a prosecutor."
The scale of the opioid addiction problem is immense. It has become so widespread, touching so many families in states across the country that the administration has begun calling it "the crisis next door."
Daly doesn't know anyone personally who's died from an opioid overdose, but she said that doesn't mean she hasn't seen the epidemic's toll.
"As a prosecutor, you interact with people who are addicted, and it's startling for me to see the grip that this addiction had on people," she said. "I've been a drug prosecutor for 13 years, and I have to tell you I've never seen anything like this."
Over her career, Daly has helped prosecute drug cases of all stripes, from marijuana to heroin and everything in between. But she said that when the powerful synthetic opioid fentanyl and its analogues began showing up a few years ago, it had a devastating effect.
"It was never a good scenario to begin with. You have prescription drugs, many people getting hooked on those prescription drugs, and so we don't want to take our eyes off the ball in terms of trying to enforce the laws and prevent diversion of pharmaceutical drugs because we don't want that pool of addicted population to continue increasing," she said. "But nonetheless, fentanyl is very scary because it's being laced in heroin, but not only heroin. It's now showing up in cocaine. It's being pressed into counterfeit pills."
Those pills, she said, could be sold as Xanax or any number of things on the black market, with deadly consequences.
"These unwitting recreational drug users who may not have an opioid tolerance are going to be taking this, and dying," she said.
Last month, President Trump unveiled his plan for tackling the opioid crisis. His proposal included expanded access for treatment and recovery services.
But in a speech in New Hampshire, Trump emphasized a get-tough law enforcement approach that included instructing the Justice Department to pursue the death penalty for drug traffickers, where appropriate under current law.
The president's comments, which echoed earlier hardline remarks, have fueled concerns in some quarters that the administration wants to return the heavy-handed drug-war tactics of years past.
"Good drug policy is about balance between reducing supply and reducing demand, and a lot of the language and rhetoric that comes out does feel a little too heavy on the law enforcement side," said Tym Rourke, an advocate for opioid addiction treatment and the director of New Hampshire Tomorrow. "That's the part that is most concerning."
Daly said treatment and recovery are important components of the administration's opioid initiative, but she said law enforcement has a crucial role to play.
"I think we should not underplay the importance of aggressive enforcement when it comes to this epidemic," she said.
As opioid coordinator, it's Daly's job to manage the Justice Department's various anti-opioid efforts.
She oversees prosecutors assigned to focus on health care fraud in opioid hot spots. She works with federal authorities who are targeting the flow of heroin and fentanyl into the country and going after online vendors. And she has a hand in Justice Department efforts to support states and local governments engaged in litigation with drug companies.
In her new job, Daly works out of an office on the fourth floor of the Justice Department in Washington, D.C.
It marks a return of sorts for her. She used to visit the building as a kid when her father, William Barr, served as President George H.W. Bush's attorney general.
"I was young when he was attorney general," Daly said. "And I have great memories of coming to the Department of Justice, and I also had the opportunity to see him sort of in action."
Now, Daly shows up at the department with serious work of her own: trying to reduce the number of Americans dying in one of the worst drug crises in the nation's history.
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Court rejects Arkansas attorney general's request, won't pull prosecutor from opioid suit
Apr 7, 2018 | Arkansas Online (AR)
By Amanda Claire Cucio
In a unanimous decision Friday, the Arkansas Supreme Court denied the attorney general's demand that a prosecuting attorney drop a lawsuit against opioid-makers that's similar to her own.
The high court's one-page formal order does not include an explanation of its ruling.
Attorney General Leslie Rutledge filed a lawsuit last month in Pulaski County against three opioid manufacturers that blamed the companies for fueling the opioid epidemic in Arkansas, where there are more painkiller prescriptions than people.
The other lawsuit was filed 10 days earlier in Crittenden County by Prosecuting Attorney Scott Ellington, representing the state, and a coalition of 87 Arkansas cities and counties. That suit targets opioid-makers, as well as distributors and retailers, for their part in the public health crisis.
In an emergency petition for writ of mandamus filed Monday, Rutledge argued that she was the state's "chief law officer" and that Ellington didn't have the authority to represent Arkansas in the litigation. Ellington is prosecutor for the 2nd Judicial Circuit, which covers Clay, Craighead, Crittenden, Greene, Mississippi and Poinsett counties.
Ellington responded to her petition Wednesday, asserting that Rutledge's interpretation of the law was "cherry-picked" and that he had "concurrent power" to represent the state in litigation.
The justices sided with Ellington. After the decision was released Friday, the prosecutor told the Arkansas Democrat-Gazette that he believed that he "had the law on his side" and that he "was confident the Supreme Court would follow the law."
"We fully believe that what these Arkansas counties and cities are doing on behalf of their communities is right and just," said Chris Villines, executive director of the Association of Arkansas Counties, in a prepared statement released Friday. Villines' organization is a lead plaintiff in the Ellington suit.
In a prepared response to the decision, Rutledge's staff said that tens of millions of dollars are at stake and that the attorney general will "continue to aggressively pursue her case."
"The Attorney General hopes that both lawsuits are successful in holding those responsible for the opioid crisis accountable and to provide much needed resources to the cities, counties and state to combat it," the statement said.
The attorney general's 52-page suit against the opioid-makers, filed March 29, argues that the sued opioid companies -- Purdue Pharma, Johnson & Johnson and Endo Pharmaceuticals -- violated trade laws by lying about the risks and benefits associated with their addictive painkillers through a deceitful marketing scheme for years.
She also claims that these companies committed Medicaid fraud since the state wouldn't have reimbursed claims for these prescriptions if the opioid-makers hadn't lied about the drugs' effectiveness in chronic-pain patients.
Between 1999 and 2017, the state's Medicaid program reimbursed pharmacies at least $6.2 million for prescriptions for opioids made by the three companies, according to an analysis of federal data by the Democrat-Gazette. Medicaid covered more than 670,000 individual prescriptions for those companies' opioids during those years, the newspaper's analysis shows.
Arkansas law says that actions under the Medicaid Fraud False Claims Act must be filed in Pulaski County Circuit Court if the defendants are out of state. Under that reasoning, Rutledge can't join the coalition's suit, which is filed in Crittenden County Circuit Court, her staff wrote in the response to the Supreme Court's ruling.
The coalition's litigation makes many of the same claims as Rutledge's suit, but argues that opioid-makers were grossly negligent, caused a public nuisance and endangered the public health, welfare and safety of Arkansans.
Court records reveal that Rutledge and the coalition don't agree on strategies for litigating against the opioid industry. Both sides lobbed criticisms at each other for contracting with private attorneys. The attorney general and coalition leaders, namely Villines and Arkansas Municipal League officials, also claimed they intended to sue the drug firms first.
Rutledge insists that having two separate suits hurts Arkansas' chances of receiving punitive monetary damages.
Ellington says both cases can exist in concert with each other and that if he were to leave the coalition-led suit, it would get swallowed in a group litigation effort against the opioid industry in Ohio federal court.
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Warren calls for new federal approach to opioid crisis
Apr 6, 2018 | Associated Press
By Steve Leblanc
U.S. Sen. Elizabeth Warren is calling for the federal government to confront the opioid addiction crisis like it ultimately attacked the AIDS epidemic in the 1980s.
The Massachusetts Democrat said Friday that she will be unveiling legislation next week with Democratic U.S. Rep. Elijah Cummings, of Maryland, that would pump $100 billion in federal funding over the next 10 years to help communities battle the crisis that claims tens of thousands of lives each year.
Warren said the goal is to make sure funding goes directly to the hardest-hit counties where the most people are dying from drug overdoses. The bill also would ensure a portion of the money goes directly from the federal government to clinics and nonprofits pioneering new models of treatment.
The crisis has been decades in the making, but the response of the federal government hasn’t kept pace, Warren said
“Empty rhetoric and half measures won’t get the job done,” said Warren, who is facing re-election in November. “We need serious legislation that doesn’t just nibble around the edges of the problem. We need serious legislation that attacks the problem hard and commits the resources necessary to root it out.”
Warren made the announcement during a visit to an area of Boston previously known as the “Methadone Mile,” but rebranded as “Recovery Road.”
A spending plan signed by President Donald Trump last month commits the federal government to spend a record $4.6 billion this year to fight the crisis, which killed 42,000 Americans in 2016.
Some advocates said the funding isn’t enough to create the kind of treatment system needed to reverse the crisis. A White House report last fall said the overdose epidemic costs the country more than $500 billion a year.
Warren said her bill is modeled after the Ryan White CARE Act, which targeted federal funds to areas of the country most impacted by the HIV virus. White, an Indiana teenager, became a global advocate for AIDS patients after he contracted the disease through a blood transfusion. He died in 1990.
There are parallels between the early years of the AIDS epidemic and the opioid crisis, Warren said.
In both instances, people were stigmatized and blamed for their disease, the federal government under-invested in basic science and lawmakers initially lacked the courage to confront the crisis, she said.
The Kaiser Family Foundation has found the U.S. is spending more than $7 billion annually on discretionary domestic funding on AIDS, an epidemic with a death toll that peaked in 1995 at 43,000.
In Massachusetts, estimates of opioid-related overdose deaths declined by more than 8 percent during 2017 after rising steadily for several years. The decline came as the state enacted new laws to combat the crisis.
Still, the number of deaths is sobering.
The Massachusetts Department of Public Health earlier this year estimated there were 1,977 opioid-related overdose deaths in the state last year, down 8.3 percent from the 2,155 deaths in 2016.
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Don’t lecture physicians on ‘cautious prescribing’ of opioids (Opinion)
Apr 9, 2018 | Modern Medicine Network
By Lori Rousche
With the opioid crisis touching almost every life in this country, there are new guidelines for prescribing medications for chronic pain. Every day there is another tragic story concerning this epidemic in the local newspaper. Thousands are dying of overdoses and patients and families incur extensive suffering. It is estimated that 115 lives are lost per day to opioid overdose in the United States.
Recently, in my local paper, there was an article about an opioid drug manufacturer who agreed to stop promoting opioids to doctors. The company eliminated half of its sales force and was no longer going to send representatives to doctors’ offices to promote the drug. A director of an opioid policy research group at a well-known university thought this was helpful. However, he said it would not make a big difference unless other opioid drug companies did the same.
He said it was “difficult to promote more cautious prescribing to the medical community because opioid manufacturers promote opioid use.”
You may want to read that last sentence again. It is preposterous. The medical community as well as the lay community are all too aware of the need for more cautious prescribing. I don’t know of any physicians who are writing opioid prescriptions willy-nilly nor inappropriately because of drug company sales representatives pitches at this point in time. This is an epidemic burning across our country wreaking havoc with young and old alike. Doctors don’t need someone to tell them not to prescribe opioids. We are very aware of the issue.
It hits us head on every day in the office with patients who have lost children, spouses who are in bankruptcy and afraid to go home, and children who don’t understand what is wrong with mom or dad. Please don’t think that a sales representative can talk us into contributing to this crisis. Physicians as a group tend to be caring, and want the best for our patients. The best for everyone regarding opioids is very close monitoring of prescriptions and limited amounts dispensed.
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Pam Bondi says Florida will file opioid lawsuit
Apr 6, 2018 | News Service of Florida (FL)
By Staff
Attorney General Pam Bondi said this week Florida plans to file a lawsuit against drug companies because of the opioid epidemic that has led to overdose deaths across the state.
Bondi, who contends the pharmaceutical industry shares some of the blame for the problems, said her office is interviewing outside lawyers to assist in the litigation. While other lawsuits have been filed against the industry, Bondi said it is important that Florida file its own case to try to stop what she calls “bad behavior” by drug companies.
“Florida, as the third-largest state in the country, we will be filing our own lawsuit just as we did in the BP oil spill,” Bondi said, referring to the Deepwater Horizon disaster in the Gulf of Mexico. “Florida deserves the maximum compensation for all of the deaths that have happened in our state.”
Bondi did not give a timetable for filing the suit and said Florida is working with cities, counties and states that have already filed cases against drug companies.
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Pam Bondi wants to sue drug companies, but she still hasn’t found a lawyer
Apr 9, 2018 | Tampa Bay Times (FL)
By Lawrence Mower
Attorney General Pam Bondi last week that she will sue the big drug makers and distributors who contributed to today's heroin crisis.
But there's one thing she still hasn't done: find outside lawyers to take up the case.
For at least two months, her office says it's been looking, but hasn't decided on anyone.
That's a critical first step toward bringing in potentially hundreds of millions of dollars to Florida to help handle the epidemic, and one candidate for attorney general this year says the office should already have hired someone and filed a lawsuit.
"I think that's a big joke, because a lot of these localities have already done the interviews and have hired appropriate counsel," said Ryan Torrens, a Tampa lawyer and Democrat. "It should be well into litigation by now."
Bondi said last week that she won't be joining a massive multi-state lawsuit being coordinated by a federal judge in Ohio.
"Florida, as the third-largest state in the country, we will be filing our own lawsuit just as we did in the BP oil spill," Bondi said.
But she gave no timetable for the lawsuit.
The heroin crisis has grown deadlier each year in Florida since 2011, yet dozens of states have already sued the opioid manufacturers and drug distributors that experts believe played a critical role in creating the problem.
Palm Beach County has already found outside counsel and filed a lawsuit against more than two dozen people and companies, including CVS, Walmart and Johnson & Johnson, according to the Palm Beach Post.
The City of Delray Beach, Miami-Dade County, Pinellas County, Alachua County, Osceola County, Pasco County, the City of Tifton and others have already either sued the drug makers or voted to hire lawyers to do so.
If Bondi wants to find a lawyer, she wouldn't have to go far. Law firms in Tampa Bay have have joined suit, and one of the biggest law firms handling opioid lawsuits across the country is the Pensacola-based firm Levin Papantonio.
That firm is representing more than 350 government agencies suing opioid manufacturers and distributors, according to the firm's website.
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Palm Beach County files 266-page lawsuit against dozens of companies in opioid crisis
Apr 6, 2018 | WPTV (FL)
By Andrew Ruiz
Palm Beach County has filed suit against dozens of companies and firms who it says is responsible for the opioid epidemic impacting our area.
The suit says the county was “forced to expend exorbitant amounts of money, due to the epidemic and as a direct result of the actions of defendants.”
Some of the defendants named include major companies like: Walgreens, CVS, Walmart, Johnson & Johnson and pharmaceutical companies like Purdue Pharma.
“This case is about one thing: corporate greed. Defendants put their desire for profits above the health and well-being of Palm Beach County consumers at the cost of plaintiff,” the suit says.
The county says the companies used unfair and deceptive practices as late as the 1990s to realize "blockbuster profits."
Last year Palm Beach County recorded nearly 600 opioid overdose deaths and says nearly 5,000 people overdosed in Palm Beach County in 2016.
In 2017, the county allocated an additional $3 million in local funding specifically to address the opioid problem.
This suit aims to recoup some of those cost, which others have been successful at recouping. It has been reported that similar cases have settled for as high as $150 million.
WPTV will begin to reach out to the defendants named in the case, which was filed Thursday in Palm Beach County Circuit Court.
Delray Beach, a city that's been heavily impacted by the opioid crisis, already filed a similar suit last year.
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Florida County Sues Companies For Aiding Opioid Crisis
Apr 6, 2018 | The Daily Caller
By Amber Randall
Palm Beach County in Florida filed a lawsuit Thursday against major corporations alleging some of their business practices led to the rise of the opioid crisis.
The county in the lawsuit accuses corporations like Walmart, CVS and Walgreens for using “unfair” marketing techniques to “reverse” common understanding of opioids, which led more people to be prescribed them, reported The Palm Beach Post.
“Defendants, through a sophisticated, highly deceptive and unfair marketing campaign that began in the late 1990s, deepened around 2006, and continues to the present, set out to, and did, reverse the popular and medical understanding of opioids,” the complaint alleges. “Chronic opioid therapy—the prescribing of opioids to treat chronic pain long-term—is now commonplace.”
The opioid crisis has spiked over the past few years and Palm Beach County has been particularly affected by the crisis. A November 2017 report named the county as the “epicenter” of the crisis in the state as there were 571 heroin overdoses in the county in 2016.
“The thousands of Palm Beach County families struck by this epidemic deserve to hold someone accountable for deceptive, unscrupulous practices involving opioid dispensing, advertising and prescribing,” Palm Beach County Mayor Melissa McKinlay, a Democrat, noted in a statement about the lawsuit.
A total of 29 defendants are named in the lawsuit. One defendant released a statement pushing back against the lawsuit and its accusations.
“Given our role, the idea that distributors are responsible for the number of opioid prescriptions written defies common sense and lacks understanding of how the pharmaceutical supply chain actually works and is regulated. Those bringing lawsuits would be better served addressing the root causes, rather than trying to redirect blame through litigation,” John Parker, SVP, Healthcare Distribution Alliance, told The Daily Caller News Foundation.
Walmart, CVS and Walgreens did not return request for comment in time for publication.
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Editorial: Palm Beach County brings stinging case to court on opioids (Opinon)
Apr 8, 2018 | My Palm Beach Post (FL)
By The Editorial Board
“This case is about one thing: corporate greed.”
So begins the lawsuit filed by the government of Palm Beach County against the pharmaceutical manufacturers, distributors and sellers behind the opioid crisis that has cost this region so much in lives and money.
The 266-page complaint lays out a compelling case that it wasn’t a public health crisis or a medical breakthrough or some widespread moral failing that has caused thousands of Americans to grow addicted to painkillers such as OxyContin and fentanyl, so captive that many moved on to heroin. It was a business strategy, gone amok. Drugmakers saw the chance to develop a market and did so, heedless of the lethal consequences. Or even basic ethics.
“Defendants,” the lawsuit continues, “put their desire for profits above the health and well-being of Palm Beach County consumers.”
The 29 defendants include the nation’s largest makers of opioids — such as Purdue Pharma, maker of OxyContin, which has already paid $635 million in criminal and civil penalties for misbranding its showcase product — and such household names as Walgreen’s, CVS and Walmart.They deny any role in creating or worsening the opioid epidemic.
The sweeping lawsuit, filed Thursday in Palm Beach County Circuit Court, is an attempt to recover millions of dollars that the county has spent to cope with the epidemic’s ramifications — from emergency responses to overdoses, to an overwhelmed medical examiners’ office, to spikes in homelessness and foster care. And, in 2017, 600 opioid deaths.
Wisely, county commissioners forged ahead with the lawsuit despite reservations about one of the law firms spearheading the effort; those problems can be worked out later. The county has thus joined Delray Beach and Broward County as local entities taking aggressive legal action against businesses that have profited off the communities’ misery.
On Thursday, Attorney General Pam Bondi said that Florida, too, would file suit against the drug industry for its “bad behavior.” For the Republican leadership of the state to join Democratic-leaning South Florida would be a strong statement. And a fitting one. Statewide, the epidemic is showing no sign of abating. Last year, opioids were identified as either the cause of death or were present in the decedent’s system in 5,725 cases — a 35 percent increase over 2016.
Bondi could well use the Palm Beach County lawsuit as a template. In broad strokes and closely documented detail, it draws a portrait of a massive con job, cloaked in the trustworthy garb of a doctor’s white jacket.
For decades, the lawsuit argues, opioid painkillers were rightly feared for their potential for addiction. But starting in the 1990s, Purdue and the other drugmakers began spending hundreds of millions of dollars to convince doctors that opioids were safe: advertising in medical journals, planting fake medical literature, having supposedly unbiased speakers appear at physicians’ conferences who were actually paid by the drug companies.
“Like cigarette manufacturers, which engaged in an industry-wide effort to misrepresent the safety and risks of smoking,” the lawsuit states, drug makers carried out “a common scheme to deceptively present the risks, benefits, and superiority of opioids to treat chronic pain.”
The results were wildly successful. “The United States is now awash in opioids. In 2012, health care providers wrote 259 million prescriptions for opioid painkillers — enough to medicate every adult in America around the clock for a month. Twenty percent of all doctors’ visits in 2010 resulted in the prescription of an opioid, nearly double the rate in 2000.”
And this meant incredible profits. “Together, opioids generated $8 billion in revenue for drug companies in 2012. Of that amount, $3.1 billion went to Purdue for its OxyContin sales. By 2015, sales of opioids grew further to approximately $9.6 billion.”
Among the defendants is Insys Therapeutics, which prosecutors have called “a criminal enterprise masquerading as a pharmaceutical company.” The Post’s John Pacenti and Holly Baltz have documented the seamy ways this firm peddled fentanyl, a synthetic painkiller 50 times more powerful than heroin.
The question in this case is simple. Can businesses that got wildly rich by deceptively expanding the use of opioid painkillers, or looking the other way while it was happening, be held accountable for the enormous harm they’ve done?
The answer is yes, a thousand times yes.
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Arkansas Senate: State suing opioid manufacturers
Apr 8, 2018 | Magnolia Reporter (AR)
By Staff
The manufacturers of prescription painkillers are facing a barrage of lawsuits from state and local governments across the United States.
The Arkansas lawsuits allege that the pharmaceutical companies used deceptive trade practices to downplay the potentially lethal effects of painkillers. As a result, greater numbers of people are addicted to painkillers, known as opioids, and greater numbers are dying from overdoses.
In 2016, there were 401 fatal drug overdoses in Arkansas. That is four times the number of Arkansans who died from drug overdoses in 1999.
According to the lawsuit filed by the state attorney general last week, 236 million doses of opioids were prescribed in Arkansas in 2016. That equals about 78 pills for every resident in Arkansas. In a few rural counties the number of pills sold per capita was much higher, for example, in five counties the average was 150 pills sold per person.
The dramatic rise in abuse of painkillers is ruining families and straining the resources of law enforcement agencies and treatment programs. It is the cause of increased visits to hospital emergency rooms, and painkillers are showing up more frequently in newborn babies. There are effective antidotes that if applied in time can save the life of a person who is overdosing, but they are expensive.
The attorney general’s lawsuit alleges that the pharmaceutical companies committed Medicaid fraud, claiming that Medicaid would not have paid reimbursements for the prescription painkillers if the companies had been truthful about the drugs’ effectiveness in managing pain over the long term.
Traditionally, the painkillers were prescribed for acute pain for short periods. In recent years, according to the lawsuits, the drug companies have marketed the painkillers for chronic, long-term pain management, which results in addiction and other serious side effects.
This has increased the market for painkillers dramatically, and opioids are now the most commonly prescribed drug in the United States, according to the lawsuit.
A coalition of Arkansas cities and counties also has filed a lawsuit against pharmaceutical companies that manufacture and sell opioids. On its own, Pulaski County has filed a similar lawsuit.
The Centers for Disease Control and Prevention say that nationally 42,000 people died from opioid overdoses in 2016.
In 2011 the legislature created the state’s Prescription Drug Monitoring Program, and has updated it several times since. Last year lawmakers approved Act 820, which requires physicians to consult with the program before prescribing opioids and addictive drugs.
Causing particular alarm is the growing presence of fentanyl, because it is so dangerous and has caused so many fatal overdoses. Abuse of fentanyl caused 20,000 deaths nationwide in 2016, and because of its lethal nature there is now an ongoing debate about the extent to which lawmakers should increase penalties for its distribution. Some elected officials and advocacy groups support the death penalty for large-scale dealers of fentanyl.
Nationwide, hundreds of lawsuits have been filed against the drug manufacturers. The defendants include some of the most well known and widely traded companies on the stock market.
South Arkansas state senators:
District 12 (Columbia and Dallas counties, parts of Ouachita, Nevada, Clark and Grant counties) – Bruce Maloch, Democrat. 650 Columbia Road 258, Magnolia, 71753. 870-235-7041. bruce.maloch@senate.ar.gov
District 11 (Lafayette, Miller and Little River counties, parts of Hempstead and Sevier counties) – Jimmy Hickey Jr., Republican. 3216 E. 35th St., Texarkana, 71854. 903-824-8861. jimmy.hickey@senate.ar.gov
District 27 (Union and Calhoun counties, parts of Ouachita, Cleveland, Clark and Jefferson counties) – Trent Garner, Republican. P.O. Box 11135, El Dorado, 71730. 870-818-9219. trent.garner@senate.ar.gov
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City of Orangeburg may sue drug companies
Apr 6, 2018 | The T&D (SC)
By Gene Zaleski
The City of Orangeburg is joining a other municipalities across the nation that are considering suing pharmaceutical companies and distributors for costs resulting from the opioid abuse epidemic.
Orangeburg City Council voted 6-1 on Tuesday to retain seven law firms, including Johnson, Toal and Battiste PA, to represent the city against Purdue Pharma L.P. and other defendants.
The city will reimburse the law firms out of the gross amount recovered, according to the agreement. If the city does not make any recovery, the city will not have to reimburse any costs for the firms.
Councilman Charlie Jernigan voted in opposition, saying "I really don't understand exactly what retaining that law firm is doing for the city and what good it will be doing for the city, especially if there are more law firms out there that may come forward.
"I am not clear on all the ins and outs of what it will mean to retain that law firm."
City Administrator John Yow said the retainer simply means that the city has entered into an agreement to retain the firms to represent the city in opioid-related litigation.
"They would come back to the City of Orangeburg and give us updates on where they think we should go," he said.
Yow said there has been no analysis done at this point on how much the opioid crisis has cost the city.
"That research will be done in conjunction with the law firm," Yow said. "At this is point, we would have to meet with the legal team to see what costs they deem as appropriate to pursue."
Orangeburg Department of Public Safety Chief Mike Adams said opioid use is growing in the city.
"We have been dealing with the opioid epidemic for a number of years, but recently, in the last year, we had a pretty significant uptick in our jurisdiction," Adams said.
Adams says the department does have access to Narcan, which is an opiate antidote.
"We now have medicine to counteract the effects of the opioid to really save that person’s life," he said. Officers carry the product with them in the event it is needed.
According to the S.C. Department of Health and Environmental Control, there were four opioid deaths in Orangeburg County in 2016.
The same year saw 550 deaths statewide from overdoses with prescription opioid drugs. That’s up 7 percent from 2015 and up 18 percent from 2014.
Purdue manufactures pain medication, including Oxycontin.
An attempt to reach Purdue Pharma for comment was unsuccessful.
In an interview with the Los Angeles Times earlier this month, Purdue spokesman Robert Josephson said, "pointing fingers isn't a way to get the resolution we need.
"Pointing to one company and one product that never constituted more than 3.6 percent of total prescriptions really misses the mark."
On its website, Purdue has denied allegations against it and said it has spent years developing an abuse-deterrent formulation, which received Federal Drug Administration approval in 2010.
Purdue Pharma has also said when abuse is seen, the company discontinues its interaction with the prescriber or pharmacist and initiates an investigation.
In news reports, Purdue Pharma has said it has "restructured” and reduced commercial operations and will no longer be promoting opioids to prescribers.
Purdue field sales organizations will also no longer visit offices to engage in discussion about opioid products, according to media reports.
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District attorneys general want Tennessee AG's move to take over opioid lawsuit denied
Apr 7, 2018 | Bristol Herald Courier (VA)
By Lurah Spell
Northeast Tennessee district attorneys general who filed a lawsuit against three major opioid manufacturers want Tennessee Attorney General Herbert Slatery’s motion to take over the case to be denied.
The plaintiffs’ response in opposition to Slatery’s motion to intervene was filed in Sullivan County Circuit Court in Kingsport Thursday.
In March, Slatery filed the motions in three lawsuits brought by 14 district attorneys general across Tennessee who want to hold drug-makers and individuals responsible for the opioid crisis. The district attorneys general believe Slatery is trying to undermine their litigation.
The first lawsuit was filed by three district attorneys general from Northeast Tennessee, including Sullivan County DAG Barry Staubus. The suit was filed against opioid manufacturer Purdue Pharma and its related companies, Mallinckrodt Pharmaceuticals and Endo Pharmaceuticals, in June 2017.
The suit alleges that a 20-year fraudulent marketing campaign downplayed the effects of opioid prescription drug use and fueled the state’s “opioid epidemic.” Individuals, including a Morristown doctor, are also being sued.
Gerard Stranch, the lead attorney representing the plaintiffs, said Friday he will file similar responses in opposition to Slatery’s motion in the local courts of the jurisdictions of the other suits.
The response states that Slatery has told all of the district attorneys general involved in the lawsuits that he needs them to “drop their lawsuits or stay them so that he can negotiate a settlement with the drug producer defendants.” Stranch told the Bristol Herald Courier on Friday that Slatery made those statements a few times in meetings, but never in court.
“The opioid manufacturers are thrilled with this development: they are now relying on the Attorney General’s motion as a basis to dismiss the District Attorneys’ claims,” the response states.
Opioid manufacturers have filed motions to dismiss the suits, according to Stranch.
“The Attorney General has told the District Attorneys that they are seeking too high a recovery from the major
pharmaceutical companies, who could
be forced out of business if a settlement in the ‘billions’ [rather than millions] is reached,” the response states.
Stranch reiterated in the response the reasons why Slatery shouldn’t be able to intervene that were listed in a March 20 joint letter signed by all 14 district attorneys general involved in the three suits that was sent to Slatery:
» Slatery doesn’t have the authority to control the district attorneys generals’ litigation because they have broad authority to act pursuant to the Drug Dealer Liability Act without the attorney general’s approval, participation, or supervision;
» Slatery’s claim that the district attorneys general aren’t authorized to hire outside counsel is without merit because the statute referenced applies to situations that involve outside counsel being paid with state funds. Agreements with attorneys state that they would only be paid if they win. Staubus previously said the defendants would be responsible for paying attorneys;
» The district attorneys agree with Slatery’s complaint against the constitutionality of the punitive damages caps being challenged. The response clarifies that only Baby Doe is challenging the constitutionality of the punitive damages cap. Baby Doe, born in Sullivan County with neonatal abstinence syndrome, is a plaintiff and the face of the Northeast Tennessee lawsuit.
Since the letter was sent to Slatery, the district attorneys general decided to drop their allegation that the state’s public nuisance statute was violated because the attorney general would have the right to take half of any settlement. A notice of voluntary dismissal was filed in court with the response to the motion to intervene. For purposes of the common law public nuisance claim and the Drug Dealer Liability Act, the district attorneys general are only suing as to the respective geographic areas they serve.
The response claims Slatery was aware of the lawsuit from the date of its filing and that the district attorneys general hired outside counsel who he refused to respond to but allowed the case to be prosecuted “unimpeded” for nine months before intervening. Under Tennessee’s Rules of Civil Procedure, that constitutes an untimely response, which would mean forfeiture of the right to intervene, according to the response. Stranch argues that Slatery’s motion should be denied on that basis alone.
The plaintiffs also claim in the response that Slatery’s motion ignores the longstanding separation of powers between his office and the district attorneys general. Under Tennessee law, Slatery can’t interfere with civil litigation initiated by district attorneys.
Slatery has not identified any statute that expressly gives him an “unconditional right to intervene” in the lawsuit, according to the response. It goes on to say Slatery must show he has a “substantial legal interest in the subject matter of the pending litigation, disposition of the action may impair his ability to protect that interest, and that the parties to the underlying suit cannot adequately represent the intervenor’s interests” to intervene and that there is no statute that “explicitly” gives Slatery a conditional right to intervene.
A hearing regarding Slatery’s motion is set for April 13 at 9 a.m. in Bristol General Sessions Court.
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Apr 9, 2018 | The Record Delta (WV)
By Katie Kuba
Should Buckhannon City Council vote to join a class action lawsuit that’s being brought against pharmaceutical manufacturers for dumping massive amounts of opioids into the Mountain State?
That was one of the key questions council pondered during its Thursday meeting, but made no definitive decision on the matter, opting to wait until its April 19 meeting when mayor David McCauley and city attorney Tom O’Neill hope to have more information to present.
The city recently received a letter from Charles R. “Rusty” Webb of the Charleston-based law firm, Webb Law Centre PLLC, offering to represent the city in a class action suit against opioid manufactures and distributors. According to his April 4 letter to the city, Webb currently represents 28 cities, municipalities and counties in similar suits against drug manufacturers for “excessive distribution of pills.”
O’Neill asked council how it wished to proceed, saying the first decision the city needs to make is who will represent it, should Buckhannon decide to pursue litigation against opioid manufacturers.
“It’s way outside my area of competence, so I could not represent the city beyond outside counsel management,” O’Neill said. “The question that council should consider is whether or not it makes sense to join that group [that Webb Law Centre is representing] or seek its own counsel as part of litigation.”
McCauley asked O’Neill if he was ready to make a recommendation to council about how it should proceed.
O’Neill said he thought the city should approach Webb to discuss the terms of his offer of representation.
“The purpose of this is to compensate local governments for the cost of law enforcement, the cost of Narcan (an opioid-antagonist capable of reversing an overdose), the cost of firefighting, the cost of societal damage and social services,” O’Neill said. “When we discuss the drug epidemic in our state and country and all of the ills that it’s responsible for, each of those ills has a dollar figure attached to it as far as local government is concerned, so the purpose of this is to seek reimbursement for wrongful acts by these corporate actors in dumping opioid medication recklessly — or frankly, probably intentionally —into our communities far beyond the community’s rational need.”
Councilman CJ Rylands asked O’Neill to outline any potential risks or costs to the city. O’Neill replied that typically such class action lawsuits have “little to no risk to the client.” Compensation is usually paid on a contingency basis, O’Neill added, meaning the city will only have to pay the law firm representing it if it is awarded a settlement.
“There will be a major settlement on the order of the tobacco settlement 20 years ago, and the question is, ‘Does the city of Buckhannon want to be named a party in the lawsuit that is going to precipitate that settlement?’” O’Neill said.
Councilman David Thomas said it’s important to consider all the parties benefiting from the drug epidemic, including the manufacturers of the life-saving drug, Narcan or Naloxone.
“It’s a multi-faceted problem that we have in our country today, and I don’t really think we’re looking at it that way oftentimes,” Thomas remarked. “I think there’s another side of this whole equation that ought to have some discussion in our society. That’s just my opinion.”
O’Neill ultimately recommended council authorize himself and McCauley to enter into discussions with Webb and/or other attorneys to hash out a representation agreement, which could be presented at council’s next meeting on April 19. Council members agreed but did not officially vote on the matter.
McCauley noted that while the West Virginia Municipal League has recommended cities and towns join a class-action lawsuit against opioid manufacturers, the organization did not specify or endorse one particular law firm over another. According to Webb’s letter, his firm is representing Charleston, Huntington and Parkersburg.
In February, the Upshur County Commission entered into a contract with the Wheeling-based Fitzsimmons Law Firm PLLC, which will represent it in a suit against drug manufacturers.
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Apr 7, 2018 | Waynesville Daily Guide (MO)
By Staff
The Pulaski County Commission has agreed to join a national lawsuit taking aim at opioid manufacturers, distributors and retailers.
The county does not incur any legal fees or expense. Participation is on a contingency basis. If successful, proceeds from a settlement would be able to be earmarked for prevention programs and other services to help offset the costs being incurred by government agencies responding to the opioid crisis.
The decision by the commission was made on the recommendation of Pulaski County Prosecuting Attorney Kevin Hillman.
“There’s no risk to the county for getting involved,” Hillman said. “But there is the potential for recovery. Pulaski County has one of the highest overdose rates in the state from prescription opioids.”
The multibillion-dollar suit, similar to the tobacco litigation, includes among other entities, towns, large cities, and some states. The intention is to force manufacturers and distributors to be held accountable. The case is in federal court in Ohio.
Based on date from the Missouri Department of Health and Senior Services, between 2012 and 2016, Pulaski County recorded 45 deaths due to overdoses.
The Pulaski County Sheriff’s Department was one of the first in the state to arm deputies with an opioid antidote in an effort to stem the number of overdoses.
According to information from the National Institute on Drug Abuse, every day, more than 115 Americans die after overdosing on opioids.The misuse of and addiction to opioids—including prescription pain relievers, heroin, and synthetic opioids such as fentanyl—is a serious national crisis that affects public health as well as social and economic welfare.
The Centers for Disease Control and Prevention estimates that the total “economic burden” of prescription opioid misuse alone in the United States is $78.5 billion a year, including the costs of healthcare, lost productivity, addiction treatment, and criminal justice involvement.
According to information on the opioid crisis and its impact on Missouri from the National Institute on Drug Abuse, in 2016, there were 914 opioid-related overdose deaths in Missouri—a rate of 15.9 deaths per 100 persons—compared to the national rate of 13.3 deaths per 100,000 persons. From 2012 to 2016 heroin overdose deaths increased from 210 to 380 deaths. Synthetic opioid overdose deaths have been increasing dramatically since 2013 from 97 to 441 deaths.
NIDA data shows in 2015, Missouri providers wrote 90 opioid prescriptions per 100 persons (5.2 million prescriptions). In the same year, the average U.S. rate was 70 opioid prescriptions per 100 persons.
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Vanderburgh Co. Commission files lawsuit against opioid manufacturers, distributors
Apr 6, 2018 | Tristate Homepage (IN)
By Staff
The Vanderburgh County Commission filed a lawsuit on Friday on behalf of the county government against opioid manufacturers and distributors, alleging that they fueled the opioid crisis.
At one point, according to Vanderburgh County officials, the prescription rate for opioid pain medications was 183 prescriptions per 100 residents in Vanderburgh County.
“Over 70 people died from drug overdoses in Vanderburgh County in 2017 and we are seeing the same trend this year”, stated Vanderburgh County Commissioner President Bruce Ungethiem. “Vanderburgh County has suffered damages as a result of the opioid crisis and by joining in the lawsuit against manufacturers and distributors of opioids is a way to change the marketing practices of the pharma companies reducing the amount of prescription opioids on the street in the future and to try recoup some of the cost Vanderburgh County has incurred”, Ungethiem said.
The manufacturing companies listed in the lawsuit include Purdue Pharma, Cephalon, Teva Pharmaceuticals, Johnson & Johnson, Janssen Pharmaceuticals, Noramco, Endo Pharmaceuticals, Mallinckrodt PLC, Allergen PLC, and Watson Pharmaceuticals.
The lawsuit alleges these manufacturers deceptively marketed the appropriate uses, risks, and safety of opioids.
Opioid distributors AmerisourceBergen Drug Corporation, Cardinal health, and McKesson Corporation are also in the lawsuit.
The commissioners allege these distributors failed in their duty to report and stop suspicious orders of opioids that flooded Vanderburgh County.
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Vanderburgh County suing drug manufacturers, distributors to recoup costs of opioid crisis
Apr 6, 2018 | Courier & Press (IN)
By Tori Fater
In the midst of an opioid crisis that took dozens of lives in Vanderburgh County last year and matches a national trend of addiction and other health risks, county officials are suing opioid manufacturers and distributors for misrepresenting the risks and uses of the drugs.
Commissioners filed the lawsuit Friday in federal court announcing their plan the same day. According to a release from the county, they aim to cut down on the number of prescription opioids on the street by changing pharmaceutical companies’ marketing strategies and to “try to recoup some of the cost” to the county.
“Opioid addiction is ravaging Vanderburgh County,” the lawsuit reads. It claims manufacturers tried to create “a false perception of the safety and efficacy of opioids” and expanded use of the drugs in the process.
The same companies are facing lawsuits from hundreds of cities, counties and states that hold the companies responsible for their part in the opioid crisis.
Eighty-two people in Vanderburgh County died of drug-related causes last year, according to Vanderburgh County Coroner Steve Lockyear. That’s more than a 50 percent increase from 2016 when 50 people died after overdosing.
Lockyear said in most fatal overdoses, people have taken a combination of drugs, but his office tries to identify “the most likely culprit of the overdose.”
Opiates were the most common cause of fatal overdoses, with synthetic opioid fentanyl linked to 24 people’s deaths. Overall, 40 people died of opiate overdoses last year.
The use of opioid overdose antidote naloxone has increased over the last several years too, according to previous Courier & Press reporting. Last year, emergency personnel used the antidote 456 times on 329 patients. In 2016, they used 349 doses on 257 patients. And in 2012, only 42 naloxone doses were used all year.
Indianapolis law firm Cohen and Malad LLP is representing the county in the case, according to court documents.
The manufacturers named in the suit include Purdue Pharma, known for painkiller Oxycontin, and Endo Pharmaceuticals, known for making Percocet, as well as:
Cephalon, Inc. Teva Pharmaceuticals Johnson & Johnson Janssen Pharmaceuticals Noramco, Inc. Mallinckrodt PLC Allergan PLC and Watson Pharmaceuticals.
The county is also suing distributors Cardinal Health, AmerisourceBergen Drug Corp. and McKesson Corp., according to court documents. Those wholesalers have 85 percent of the market share for opioids in the country.
The county has asked the court to order the companies to compensate Vanderburgh County for costs to deal with “the ongoing public nuisance caused by the opioid epidemic” such as the costs of medical care, counseling and rehabilitation for addicted patients and medical treatment for children born with opioid-related medical conditions.
This is not the first time county officials have taken legal action over the opioid crisis.
In November, 37-year-old David Dimmett was indicted for murder after allegedly supplying the heroin that led to another man’s fatal overdose in July. According to the county Prosecutor’s Office, Dimmett was the first person in Vanderburgh County to be charged with murder in a drug-related death.
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St. Joseph County files lawsuit against opioid manufacturers
Apr 6, 2018 | South Bend Tribune (IN)
By Lincoln Wright
St. Joseph County officially filed its lawsuit against more than 20 manufacturers and distributors of opioid prescriptions.
County commissioners unanimously voted in February to work with Indianapolis-based law firm Cohen & Malad. The firm filed a roughly 165-page lawsuit in the Northern Indiana District of U.S. Court Friday.
St. Joseph County joins a continuously growing number of counties and cities across the U.S. suing opioid manufacturers and distributors for their part in causing the opioid crisis. The suits claim the companies knowingly misled the doctors and the public about the risk of addiction through "sophisticated and highly deceptive" marketing campaigns.
"Despite their knowledge, to expand the market for opioids and realize blockbuster profits, Manufacturer Defendants sought to create a false perception of the safety and efficacy of opioids in the minds of medical professionals and members of the public," the lawsuit reads.
South Bend and Marshall and LaPorte counties have also filed similar suits. All of the lawsuits are looking for financial compensation for the public money spent on battling the opioid epidemic in their communities.
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Gibbons responds to questions regarding possible opioid lawsuit
Apr 8, 2018 | The Telegraph (IL)
By Scott Cousins
Madison County State’s Attorney Tom Gibbons submitted a series of written answers to questions regarding the possibility of a lawsuit against the opioid industry at a recent Judiciary Committee meeting.
The six-page document was in response to a series of questions by Madison County Board Member Phil Chapman, R-Highland, a member of the committee.
It deals with how much the county might be expected to gain from a lawsuit, how that money could be spent, how long the process would take and ethical concerns over the bidding process to select a law firm to handle the case.
Gibbons and other county officials have been considering joining a growing number of governmental entities filing suit against opioid manufacturers.
A suit could be initiated by Gibbons under his own authority as state’s attorney, or if the County Board authorized it.
In November, the committee started seriously discussing the issue. Attorneys have claimed pharmaceutical companies created much of the problem by changing how opioids were prescribed in the mid-1990s. Prior to 1995, opioids were generally prescribed for acute pain following surgery and terminal cancer cases. That changed when doctors started prescribing opioids more readily for pain management, which led to widespread abuse.
In his written response, Gibbons noted that there is “no accurate means to determine the amount of damages” the county could receive.
He noted that one area that would be easier to determine would be actual government expenses, such as the cost of ambulance services for overdose cases.
How the money might be used would be determined by the County Board.
“I strongly recommend the board immediately engage in establishing a plan providing for the appropriation of any recovered funds,” he stated. “This would allow for an open, public discussion of possible uses.”
Whether individuals could apply for any of the money would depend on the lawsuit; governmental uses would follow three broad categories – treatment, education and law enforcement.
Regarding how long it could take, Gibbons said it would be “impossible” to give a definite answer, but compared it to tobacco litigation.
States began filing suit in 1994, he said, with Illinois joining in 1996. The 1998 master settlement included $9.1 billion for Illinois paid out over 25 years to various funds and programs.
“We can expect the process to take sometime between 2-4 years to reach settlement or longer, if trials or appeals are required,” the letter stated.
If the county joins a lawsuit, Gibbons said his office would take bids requesting law firms “or more likely groups of firms” to submit proposals. He said the process would probably take 2-4 months.
He also said that political contributions would not be allowed as part of the contract for the life of the litigation.
Because contributions are considered a free speech issue, any limitations would be “narrowly limited.”
Committee Chairman Mike Walters, R-Godfrey, said the issue would be discussed at the next committee meeting in May.
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Local doctors are backing off opioid prescriptions as crisis continues to grow
Apr 9, 2018 | South Bend Tribune (IN)
By Lincoln Wright
Dr. Todd Graham’s murder was a sobering event in the opioid epidemic. The doctor at South Bend Orthopaedics was shot and killed last summer by a patient’s husband for not prescribing opioid pain medication.
A week after Graham’s death, local doctors came together at a news conference with a promise to act. A promise to reverse the mistakes they made in helping create a reservoir of available opioid prescription pills.
“When Todd was killed, that galvanized everybody,” said Dr. Stephen Anderson, chief medical officer for Saint Joseph Health System. “I hate to say it, but it really took something like that to look at ourselves, our behaviors as prescribers and how that has contributed to the excess of narcotics in the community.”
Now it’s a struggle to balance the needs of patients who legitimately need the medication while changing prescribing practices to avoid creating a new generation of addicts. The epidemic, meanwhile, continues to grow.
Earlier this month, the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention released a report showing overdose cases had climbed by 30 percent at emergency rooms from July 2016 to September 2017. Indiana was at about 35 percent; the Midwest was the hardest-hit region, seeing a 70 percent increase in emergency room visits.
Locally, South Bend EMS used 494 doses of naloxone, the opioid-overdose antidote, in 2017, up from 338 doses the previous year. Overdose deaths in St. Joseph County did drop from 60 to 57 in 2017, but the total is still higher than the number of people killed in homicides and motor vehicle accidents combined.
But doctors appear to be changing their practices. The number of prescriptions in St. Joseph County has steadily decreased in recent years, totaling about 81 prescriptions per 100 people in 2016, according to the most recent data from CDC; that’s a drop from a 2012 high of 100 prescriptions per 100 people.
Many doctors admit they didn’t have the best prescribing practices. But they argue that they were also misled by opioid manufacturers and distributors about how addictive opioids were and whether they were the best option for treating chronic pain.
Those claims have led to federal lawsuits against manufacturers by cities and counties looking for financial reimbursement for the costs of battling the health crisis. South Bend and Marshall and LaPorte counties have all filed suits, and St. Joseph County has approved plans to also file.
‘A big impact’
Last year, local doctors set out with a goal of “no new addicts,” and Anderson says he sees progress.
“The recognition and education has already made a big impact in our community,” he said.
About four months ago, the St. Joseph Health System worked with its emergency departments to limit the amount of opioids being prescribed, especially for an acute injury. Now, emergency room doctors will only prescribe up to 12 pills of Tylenol 3, Anderson said, which has a lower risk of addiction compared to other opioid pain medications.
Before, it wasn’t uncommon for doctors to write prescriptions for 20 to 60 pills.
“We need to educate doctors that they don’t need to write large prescription for narcotics at all,” Anderson said. “You don’t want to give 60 pills. You may not want to give any. Look for other methods.”
Beacon Health System has made similar changes in its emergency room’s prescribing practices, said Dr. Brandon Zabukovic, who specializes in both family and addiction medicine. The ERs are instructed to only prescribe a few days’ worth of pain medication, giving the patient enough relief until they can meet with their doctor.
Beyond the emergency room, other doctors within Saint Joseph Health are encouraged to discuss their opioid prescribing practices, Anderson said. Trinity Health, Saint Joseph Health’s parent company, also expects prescribing doctors to complete at least two hours of continuing education on opioid management by 2019.
Beacon will focus on its surgical department, Zabukovic said. Doctors will travel to Virginia this month to work with the Mayo Clinic on prescribing practices for patients recovering from general surgery.
It’s not only doctors making changes. Indiana legislators and the Indiana State Medical Association are also influencing prescribing practices.
Last month, ISMA was awarded $230,000 to launch a program later this year that will offer opioid-prescribing courses for Indiana doctors. The courses will be based on best practices and customized for different specialties.
Legislators also passed two laws, one requiring doctors to receive at least two hours of training on opioid prescribing every two years. The other requires doctors prescribing any medications to check INSPECT, a statewide database that tracks a patient’s prescriptions. Doctors will know if another physician recently prescribed opioids to the patient.
An over-correction?
While doctors are making changes, some patients are getting worried about their pain treatment.
Steven Martin from Elkhart fears doctors are over-correcting. He says he relies on his monthly opioid prescription to get through the day. Martin typically takes three to four pain pills a day for his chronic back pain, but he says he sticks to his prescription and doesn’t misuse them.
Other treatments, such as physical therapy, only made his pain worse, he said. And while he wishes he wasn’t on opioids, he sees the pain killers as his only option for now. He doesn’t want doctors to become too fearful of prescribing the pills.
“I can’t move around,” Martin said about being off his medication. “The pain is too much. It’s just agony.”
Doctors may be pulling back on the amount of opioids they are prescribing, but there still is a place for the narcotic prescriptions, Zabukovic said.
He believes a relatively small number of people clearly need the medication. Still, he said, “we have to be really cautious about swinging the pendulum too far away for people that might benefit. Trying to find the right person and the right amount is very difficult, but we don’t want people to go untreated.”
What patients and doctors need to do is change the way they view pain, said Dr. Stacie Wenk, president-elect of the Indiana State Medical Association. The guidance doctors were getting over several years was to guide patients to a pain-free state, she said.
Wenk believes doctors need to work with their patients to manage the pain and be able to function throughout a day — not necessarily reach a level of zero pain.
“We have to do a lot of education of people that painlessness is not a reasonable expectation,” Zabukovic said.
And there are alternatives to opioids for pain treatment, doctors say. But those treatments pose a whole other problem — insurance coverage.
Treatments such as physical therapy, massage therapy, chiropractic work and acupuncture aren’t always covered by insurance. Even if an insurance policy offers some coverage, the out-of-pocket expenses can still be steep if a patient needs months of treatment.
“A lot of these things are not well covered,” Anderson said. “It’s a lot easier for a doctor to write a prescription and say ‘see you in a month.’”
The state medical association went to state legislators this year with a resolution to broaden insurance coverage, but it didn’t get far because of the complexity of the issue.
“It’s not an easy topic to cover,” Wenk said.
Wenk doesn’t see insurance companies as necessarily opposed to covering other treatments. Studies still need to be conducted on the effectiveness of alternative treatments. In the end, she says, it’s a matter of education, not resistance.
“I think we have gone down the traditional path so long that these concepts are new,” she said. “I think they are willing to have conversations about this.”
Martin, the patient from Elkhart, would welcome new forms of therapy for his pain. He understands the addictive threat of opioids. He has gone through withdrawal before and knows he’ll need help if he finds a permanent solution to his pain and no longer needs his pills.
Until that happens, he’s worried that with more pressure on doctors because of the opioids crisis, his monthly allotment will start to decrease or completely stop.
“I wish people would stop abusing them,” Martin said. “It’s people like me that are the ones suffering.”
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Hudson County sues makers of opioids, alleging negligence and fraud
Apr 6, 2018 | NJ.com (NJ)
By Terrence T. McDonald
Hudson County this week joined the growing list of public entities suing opioid manufacturers, alleging the companies spent decades convincing the public that their drugs are safe and downplaying their addictive nature.
The drug manufacturers and distributors named in the suit — including the Sackler family, owner of Connecticut-based Purdue Pharma, the maker of OxyContin — have destroyed communities and left state and local governments to pay much of the cost of treating people addicted to opioids, the 139-page lawsuit says.
The complaint mirrors the allegations in lawsuits filed by New Jersey's attorney general, Newark and cities across the nation struggling to deal with spikes in opioid addiction, violent crime authorities believe is connected to drug addiction and drug overdose deaths. Hundreds of lawsuits targeting drug companies have been consolidated before a federal judge in Cleveland, who has said he wants a swift resolution.
Hudson County's nine-count suit is the culmination of a years-long effort by county officials. The county is accusing the drug companies of fraud, negligence and acting in violation of anti-racketeering laws. It was filed in Hudson County Superior Court on Tuesday.
In a statement, County Executive Tom DeGise called the drug manufacturers and distributors "unscrupulous profiteers."
"Hudson County taxpayers bear the cost every day for the explosive rise in addiction since the creation and promotion of these synthetic opioids in the 1990s," DeGise said. "They have paid the spiraling bill for what we have spent and will continue to spend in corrections, rehabilitation and treatment services."
DeGise added, about the defendants, "Just because they wear suits and ties doesn't make them any less a bunch of pushers — these guys just make a lot more than the corner dealer."
Drug companies named as defendants in the lawsuit say they are disturbed by the opioid epidemic but deny responsibility.
"Although our products account for less than 2 percent of the total opioid prescriptions, as a company, we've distributed the CDC Guideline for Prescribing Opioids for Chronic Pain, developed three of the first four FDA-approved opioid medications with abuse-deterrent properties and partner with law enforcement to ensure access to naloxone," reads a statement from Purdue. "We vigorously deny these allegations and look forward to the opportunity to present our defense."
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Hudson County sues makers of opioids, alleging negligence and fraud
Apr 6, 2018 | NBC Connecticut (CT)
By Staff
As the opioid crisis continues to take a grip on cities and towns across the state of Connecticut and other states, the City of New London plans to sue opioid drug manufacturers and distributors.
New London Mayor Michael Passero said the city will file a lawsuit in Connecticut Superior Court in an attempt to hold the drug manufacturers and distributors accountable for the damages incurred by New London in dealing with the opioid epidemic.
A news release from the city says New London, its agencies and personnel have “devoted an increasingly large portion of the city’s resources on public health, social and human services, law enforcement, police, fire and first responders, and outreach initiatives designed to combat the crisis” and they want the companies, rather than the taxpayers, to bear these costs.
“Tragically the opioid crisis has devastated my city. Between 2016 and 2018 there have been 16 opioid fatalities in New London, a community with a population of only 27,000 people,” Passero said in a statement.
City officials said there were also 187 non-fatal overdoses between 2016 and 2018.
“Enough is enough,” Passero said in a statement. “These companies knew that they were leading people into the gripping disease of addiction. …”
In February, the U.S. Justice Department said it would support local officials in hundreds of lawsuits against manufacturers and distributors of powerful opioid painkillers.
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City Announces Lawsuit Against Opioid Distributors, Manufacturers
Apr 6, 2018 | New London Patch (CT)
By RJ Scofield
Mayor Michael Passero announced Thursday that the city will file a lawsuit in Connecticut Superior Court to hold opioid drug manufacturers and distributors accountable for the damages incurred by New London in dealing with the opioid epidemic.
According to a news release sent out by the city, the defendants' conduct has imposed a "direct, foreseeable and substantial financial burden" on New London. As a result, the city's agencies and personnel have devoted an increasingly large portion of city resources on public health, social and human services, law enforcement, police, fire and first responders, as well as outreach initiatives designed to combat the crisis.
The city will now seek an order requiring the defendants to bear these costs, as opposed to the taxpayers.
"Tragically the opioid crisis has devastated my city," Passero said in a release. "Between 2016 and 2018 there have been 16 opioid fatalities in New London, a community with a population of only 27,000 people."
According to Passero, there were 187 non-fatal overdoses between 2016 and 2018, and the city has "incurred significant annual costs" in dealing with this crisis.
"Enough is enough," Passero said. "These companies knew that they were leading people into the gripping disease of addiction. We must demand accountability from the companies who are responsible for creating this crisis by recklessly promoting the dangerous drugs that cause devastating addiction, forcing the city to allocate ever-increasing resources to respond to this crisis. Officials in New London are working tirelessly with many dedicated partners to prevent, support and treat those impacted by this disastrous public health crisis."
Passero said the city will be represented by the law firm of Scott+Scott Attorneys at Law LLP, an international law firm headquartered in Connecticut with additional offices in New York, Ohio, California and London, England.
The firm has an exceptional track record of high-profile cases involving antitrust, securities, and other complex litigation on behalf of public entities, institutional investors, pension funds, multinational corporations and hedge funds, and has recovered billions of dollars for its clients.
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Suing drug companies is a good place to start (Opinion)
Apr 9, 2018 | The Lewiston Tribune (WA)
By Staff
In filing a lawsuit against drug companies over the region's opioid crisis, Clark County officials are rightly standing up for citizens. Evidence suggests that drug-makers have spent years overstating the benefits of painkillers while downplaying the risks, all in the name of profit.
The strength of that evidence is to be determined by the courts or hashed out through negotiations. But the impact of opioids throughout Clark County has been no less than in other areas throughout the country.
According to county officials: From 2014-17, 91 people died from opioid-related deaths not involving heroin; publicly funded treatment admissions grew 246 percent over the course of a decade and the Clark County Sheriff's Office has spent more than $5.5 million related to the opioid epidemic in three years.
While those who become addicted to prescription drugs deserve blame for their own actions, so do opioid manufacturers. Because of that, hundreds of lawsuits have been filed by cities, counties and states in an effort to hold drug companies accountable. To simplify the argument and remove the legalese: Drug companies lied in order to make more money, and people became addicted.
Drug company officials deny these allegations. But documents included in the state of Washington's lawsuit against Purdue Pharma shed some light on the discussion. According to court filings, Kelly Bell, a Clark County nurse practitioner, prescribed $1.5 million worth of the company's OxyContin during a six-month period in 2008.
"In short," the documents state, "Ms. Bell would respond to the abuse of opioids by prescribing more opioids" at the urging of Purdue representatives.
Imagine that scenario being repeated hundreds of times in a single county. Imagine it being the result of drug companies underplaying the risk of addiction in order to sell more pills. Imagine painkillers being used not only by the people for whom they were prescribed, but by their families, their friends and their kids rifling through the medicine cabinet. That is how an epidemic of legal drugs can sprout, and it is a scenario that has been devastating to this country. An investigation by the House Energy and Commerce Committee discovered that, over the course of a decade, 21 million prescription pain pills had been shipped to Williamson, W.Va. - a town of 3,200 people.
As Clark County Council Chairman Marc Boldt said: "The increased use of opioids over the last 20 years has had a devastating effect on our community. It's time to hold these drug companies accountable and take steps to reverse this disturbing trend."
Notably, county officials say the law firm that filed suit will be paid only if the action recovers damages.
There are clear parallels between the opioid crisis and the manner in which states challenged tobacco companies in the past. In 1998, 46 states (including Washington), reached a settlement with those companies after claiming unfair marketing practices. Manufacturers agreed to pay $206 billion over 25 years and to continue payments in perpetuity to offset the health care costs associated with tobacco use. They also agreed to limits on marketing, including a prohibition on advertising that targets people younger than 18.
Ideally, the fight against irresponsible opioid manufacturers will eventually result in a similar outcome. Clark County officials are wise to stand up for residents and demand accountability from drug manufacturers.
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County weights joining opioid lawsuit
Apr 6, 2018 | Whidbey News-Times (WA)
By Laura Guido
The Board of Island County Commissioners held a round-table discussion Monday to consider whether to join multi-district litigation against prescription opioid manufacturers.
The discussion included department heads and staff from Public Health, Human Services, the sheriff’s and prosecutor’s offices and attorneys from the Seattle-based firm Keller Rohrback.
No decision was made at the meeting.
Prosecutor Greg Banks told the group he became interested in the issue after reading a series of articles about the marketing tactics of the prescription manufactures and how their role is changing in how pain killers are prescribed and used.
Banks said he learned of Keller Rohrback’s representation of counties and cities in the multi-district litigation and wanted to look into the possibility of Island County getting involved.
“I know that Island County, like any other county, is suffering from the effects of opioid abuses,” he said.
Between 2012 and 2016, Island County had 38 opioid-related deaths, which is a rate of 10.9 per 100,000 population, according to Washington State Department of Health statistics. This rate is higher than the state average of 9.6 during that same time frame.
The national litigation is taking place in Ohio and more than 440 counties and cities have filed joined, said David Ko, from Keller Rohrback. Communities are suing the manufacturers Purdue Pharma LP, Janssen Pharmaceuticals Inc., Endo International Plc and more for their “improper marketing of and inappropriate distribution of various prescription opiate medications into cities, states and towns across the country,” according to the suit.
The number of communities joining the litigation has drawn comparisons to the tobacco litigation of the 1990s. Ko said that as in that settlement, it may prove beneficial to be a part of the suit if a settlement is reached.
“No one really knows how the settlement is going to be structured or shaped, but certainly if you have a seat at the table it’s more likely that you’ll have a say,” he said.
Island County Commissioner Rick Hannold questioned the effectiveness of suing the manufacturers instead of the Department of Justice for not putting anyone in jail thus far.
The multi-district litigation is a civil suit, not criminal, meaning it is seeking monetary damages and not jail time for the defendant.
“If they really want justice, if they really want to do the moral thing that’s right, they’re going to tell the Department of Justice to do their job and enforce the laws that are on the books,” Hannold said.
“In my eyes, it looks like the cities and counties and the states see a pot of money and everybody wants to grab their piece of the pie.”
Banks replied saying a prosecutor can’t be forced to file charges against someone. Ko said the money being sought is for the costs to communities’ criminal justice system, health care systems and lost productivity from those suffering from addiction.
Commissioner Jill Johnson expressed her skepticism regarding the county’s legal standing in the matter. She said the opioid epidemic was brought forward to the Board of Health and was not designated as a crisis in Island County. She also likened it to other health issues that are driven by misleading advertising, such as obesity.
“We do not sue Coca-Cola,” Johnson said. “We don’t sue McDonald’s. We don’t sue other things where there’s a known cause and effect in their marketing … What about all the people who are getting sick from other lies that are being told?”
She said she wanted to ensure the manufacturers could be directly identified as responsible for this issue. Additionally, she said she wasn’t sure the problem in Island County could specifically be linked to the prescription medication made by those manufacturers.
“I’m not sure that our population of people got their drugs that way,” she said.
Ko and another attorney from the firm, Dan Mensher, said they felt the county did have solid standing in the case. Ko pointed out that 80 percent of heroin users reported using prescription opioids prior to heroin, which is a statistic cited by the National Institute on Drug Abuse.
“Hamburgers, although delicious, are not Schedule-2 controlled substances,” Mensher replied to Johnson.
Many present verified the effects of the crisis have had an impact locally.
“We’re certainly feeling it,” said Island County Sheriff Mark Brown.
He said in response the department started carrying Narcan, which treats overdoses in emergencies, and he said the jail has begun administering medication-assisted treatment for addiction.
Deputy Rick Felici said he has seen a shift in his time with the department.
“Twenty-four years ago, when I started out as a patrol deputy, we’d never even heard of heroin,” he said. “It was unseen in Island County … Now you can’t swing a cat without hitting somebody that’s affected by heroin in this county.”
During 2017, there were three confirmed heroin-related deaths in Island County, according to state Department of Health data. There were six deaths related to prescription opioids. In 2016, there were 51 hospitalizations related to drugs, but the data on types of drugs was suppressed.
“The numbers are there,” Skye Newkirk, behavioral health coordinator, said at the meeting. He said between 2016 and 2017 the number of people going to the emergency room for overdoses doubled.
Banks said he’s seen the effect both in his work as county prosecutor and on people he knows personally.
“It’s really painful and it just didn’t need to happen,” he said. “It’s wrong. In my view, it was an intentional wrong. If the board’s inclined, I’m certainly in favor of the litigation.”
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Good Morning Suncoast at 5:00am
Apr 9, 2018 | Tampa, FL
By WWSB (ABC)
Video Link: https://app.criticalmention.com/app/#clip/view/34120448?token=15c1cbca-eeab-4eb1-a8d7-d8239143bdc6
Rough Transcript: the sait of florida will join a lawsuit against the makers and sellers of opioid. pam bondi says pharmaceutical companies are partly to blame for the problem. the stayed medical examiner says nearly 16,000 people died in 2017. but some say it won't help the issue. >> the only thing they can do to avoid further damage is to step selling this some of the things they sell. and there's a need for a lot of it. >> the city of sarasota and manatee county have already joined more than 200 municipalities
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Apr 8, 2018 | Jacksonville, FL
By WJAX (CBS)
Video Link: https://app.criticalmention.com/app/#clip/view/34120753?token=15c1cbca-eeab-4eb1-a8d7-d8239143bdc6
Rough Transcript: The florida attorney general is set to file a lawsuit against drug makers over the opioid epidemic. she says the pharmaceutical companies share some of the blame. last year governor scott declared a state of emergency in florida because of the increasing number of drug- related death in the state. she says it's important for florida to file its own lawsuit. >>> obviously the ultimate goal is to stop the bad behavior. we are in the last round of interviewing outside
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Apr 6, 2018 | Tallahassee, FL
By WTXL (ABC)
Video Link: https://app.criticalmention.com/app/#clip/view/34121062?token=15c1cbca-eeab-4eb1-a8d7-d8239143bdc6
Rough Transcript: against drug manufacturers, relating to the state's opioid problem. bondi says-- in part--- that pharmaceutical companies share some of the blame for the current opioid crisis in florida. last year, governor rick scott declared a state of emergency in florida because of the increasing number of drug-related deaths in the state. the attorney general says her office is currently interviewing outside counsel to assist the state in litigation. "we are also going to b vigorously pursuing all of these companies, just like we did in the bp oil spill. nobody is going to rush us into anything. we are going to do it when we have the most documents available. we are going to do it in the strongest way possible. we are going to stand alone in our lawsuit, as the 3rd-largest state, to help all floridians. " bondi gave no timetable as to when the suit will be filed. a host of other cities, counties and states have already filed suit against drug manufacturers. florida is also working with those parties, but bondi says it important to also have a standalone lawsuit just for floridians. coming
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Apr 6, 2018 | Orlando, FL
By WOFL (Fox)
Video Link: https://app.criticalmention.com/app/#clip/view/34120950?token=15c1cbca-eeab-4eb1-a8d7-d8239143bdc6
Rough Transcript: luanne: florida will file a lawsuit against drug manufacturers taking a stand against opioids. last year governor rick scott declaring a state of emergency because of the alarming number of deaths. the attorney general says pharmaceutical companies share the blame for the epidemic. >> also going to be vigorously pursuing all of these companies, just like we did in the bp oil spill. we're going do it when we have the most damps available, and we are going to do it the strongest way responsible going to stand alone in our lawsuit as the third
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Apr 7, 2018 | Gainesville, FL
By WOGX (Fox)
Video Link: https://app.criticalmention.com/app/#clip/view/34120835?token=15c1cbca-eeab-4eb1-a8d7-d8239143bdc6
Rough Transcript: florida taking a stand against opioids by filing a lawsuit against drug manufacturers. florida attorney general pam bomb di says -- bondi says they share the responsibility for alarming deaths in the state. >> we're going to be pursuing all these. just like the bp oil spill. no one's going to rush intiews -- rush us into anything. we are going to stand alone in our lawsuit as the third largest state to help all floridians. >> last year the
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NBC 6 South Florida News at 6pm
Apr 6, 2018 | Miami, FL
By WTJV (NBC)
Video Link: https://app.criticalmention.com/app/#clip/view/34120922?token=15c1cbca-eeab-4eb1-a8d7-d8239143bdc6
Rough Transcript: >>> the state of florida is fighting the opioid epidemic by going after the pharmaceutical industry. the attorney general pam bondi says the state plans to file lawsuits against the drug companies. she says the pharmaceutical industry shares some of the blame for the problem. she stresed the importance of florida doing its best to fight bad behavior in the drug communities. >>> we will be filing our own lawsuit just as we did in the bp oil spill because florida deserves the maximum compensation for all the deaths that have happened in our state. >> at this point, there's no timetable for filing the lawsuit, although
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Apr 6, 2018 | Orlando, FL
By WFTV (ABC)
Video Link: https://app.criticalmention.com/app/#clip/view/34120886?token=15c1cbca-eeab-4eb1-a8d7-d8239143bdc6
Rough Transcript: information about becoming a foster parent, go to our website, wftv.com. >>> flu atty. general. pam bondi says the state will file a lawsuit against the drug manufacturers and connection to the states opiate cris. bondy says
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Apr 8, 2018 | West Palm Beach, FL
By WPBF (ABC)
Video Link: https://app.criticalmention.com/app/#clip/view/34120781?token=15c1cbca-eeab-4eb1-a8d7-d8239143bdc6
Rough Transcript: Attorney general , pam bondi says florida will soon file a lawsuit against drug manufacturers. it's all related to the state's opioid crisis. bondi says, in part, that pharmaceutical companies share some of the blame for the current opioid crisis in florida. last year, governor rick scott declared a state of emergency in florida because of the increasing number of drug-related deaths in the state. the attorney general says her office is currently interviewing outside counsel to assist the state in litigation. she feels it is important that florida file its own lawsuit with a goal of stopping what she calls bad behavior by drug companies. >> florida is the third largest state in the country, we will be filing our own lawsuit just as we did in the bp oil spill. florida deserves the maximum compensation for all of the deaths that have happened in our state. farron: bondi didn't give a timetable as to when the suit will be filed. a host of other cities, counties ,
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Apr 6, 2018 | Evansville, IN
By WEVV (CBS)
Video Link: https://app.criticalmention.com/app/#clip/view/34120149?token=15c1cbca-eeab-4eb1-a8d7-d8239143bdc6
Rough Transcript: vanderburgh county is the latest to file a lawsuit against major opioid manufacturers and distributors. indianapolis based cohen and malad filed the 160 page lawsuit in the u-s southern district court today. county commissioners say they filed the suit against the drug manufacturers and distributors for their role in fueng the opioid cris. their attorneys say the rate for opioid pain medications is 183 prescriptions per 100 residents in vanderburgh county. the lawsuit names at least 10 different drug manufacturers as defendants -- including johnson and johnson and purdue pharma. it alleges the manufacturers deceptively marketed the appropriate uses, risks, and safety of opioids. distributors are also named in the lawsuit - accused of failing to report and stop the alarming amount of opioids that are in vanderburgh county. vanderburgh county
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Apr 8, 2018 | Tulsa, OK
By KOKI (Fox)
Video Link: https://app.criticalmention.com/app/#clip/view/34120651?token=15c1cbca-eeab-4eb1-a8d7-d8239143bdc6
Rough Transcript: wednesday. we have a couple of strong winds and a possibility of grass fire risk as well. coming up, will talk about how warm we will get, plus just how gusty the wind will get by the end f the week. >>> a second oklahoma tribe is suing opioid manufacturers and distributors for their role in the coutries opioid epidemic. muscogee creek nation filed a lawsuit at u.s. district court last week. lawsuit alleges the companies engage in marketing campaigns that are not truthful about the risks of using opioids. more details for you now on the creek nation lawsuit comes in nearly one year after the cherokee nation filed a similar lawsuit.
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Apr 7, 2018 | Seattle, WA
By KING (NBC)
Video Link: https://app.criticalmention.com/app/#clip/view/34120847?token=15c1cbca-eeab-4eb1-a8d7-d8239143bdc6
Rough Transcript: locked up. it is example of him using his executive power to change immigration practices after measures stalled in congress. >>> a judge rejected purdue pharma east attempt to reject a lawsuit that claims they fueled this whole opioid epidemic by misleading
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Apr 6, 2018 | Little Rock, AR
By KARK (NBC)
Video Link: https://app.criticalmention.com/app/#clip/view/34120864?token=15c1cbca-eeab-4eb1-a8d7-d8239143bdc6
Rough Transcript: alexander says miller submitted his resignation a few weeks ago. ((bob)) the state supreme court says arkansas's attorney general can't force a prosecutor to drop his lawsuit against opioid manufacturers. both attorney general leslie rutledge -- and prosecuting attorney scott ellington are leading lawsuits -- against pharmaceutical companies for their role in the opioid addiction crisis. rutledge didn't want two lawsuits going on at the same time -- and unsuccessfully argued that ellington didn't
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Apr 6, 2018 | Savannah, GA
By WJCL (ABC)
Video Link: https://app.criticalmention.com/app/#clip/view/34120891?token=15c1cbca-eeab-4eb1-a8d7-d8239143bdc6
Rough Transcript: recovered this morning in savannah.police say you should always lock you car no matter what ..even if you're leaving it unattended for just a few minutes. in our state of addiction report tonight -- a growing number of americans are aware of the opioid crisis in this country. researchers surveyed more than a thousand adults. 43- percent think the mis-use of prescription drugs is a serious problem. that's up from 33- percent just two years ago. 24 percent say opioid addiction has affected a relative, close friend ...or themselves. and 13 percent have had a loved one die from an overdose. meanwhile, the state of florida may be preparing to sue drug manufacturers regarding the opioid epidemic. the states attorney general pam bondi, says that pharmaceutical companies share ásome of the blame for the state's
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Western Mass News on ABC40 at 5:30pm
Apr 6, 2018 | Springfield, MA
By WGGB (ABC)
Video Link: https://app.criticalmention.com/app/#clip/view/34121160?token=15c1cbca-eeab-4eb1-a8d7-d8239143bdc6
Rough Transcript: senator elizabeth warren is calling for the federal government to treat the opioid addiction crisis in a way similar to how it attacked the aids epidemic in the 1980's. the massachusetts democrat is in boston today to discuss legislation that she and a maryland state representative plan to file in congress. the lawmakers plan to model the bill after the ryan white care act, which targeted federal funds to areas of the country most impacted by the h-i-v virus.
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