Attorney General Takes Opioid Companies To Court

OKLAHOMA CITY – State Attorney General Mike Hunter filed suit against three leading distributors of opioid pain medication today, for their alleged role in the ongoing opioid crisis.

The lawsuit was filed in Cleveland County District Court against the McKesson Corporation, Cardinal Health, Inc. and AmerisourceBergen Corporation. The filing explains how the companies failed to alert state and federal authorities of suspiciously large orders of the highly addictive medications they shipped into the state during the opioid epidemic.

Attorney General Hunter said the state is seeking damages for misconduct that fueled diversion, leading to the death of thousands of Oklahomans.

“These companies made billions of dollars by supplying massive and unreasonable quantities of opioids to communities throughout Oklahoma, leading to oversupply, diversion, addiction and overdose deaths,” Attorney General Hunter said. “The companies engaged in reckless behavior and need to be held accountable for their role in creating the nation’s worst manmade public health crisis that continues to devastate communities.”

“We will show how these companies skirted the rules in order to line their pockets with enormous profits. Even when the companies were heavily fined by authorities and told to stop, they viewed it as the cost of doing business and kept the shipments rolling. For them to deny culpability and continue to shift the blame for failing to protect Oklahomans is unacceptable, and they need to pay for the death and devastation caused by their greed,” Hunter added.

Opioid distributors are required by law to stop and report suspiciously large shipments of opioids to law enforcement officials unless due diligence disproves those suspicions.

The lawsuit claims the companies funneled more opioids into communities across the state than could have been expected to serve a legitimate medical need, while ignoring red flags and suspicious orders. The state alleges negligence and unjust enrichment as a result and is seeking compensatory damages.

The three companies have paid hundreds of millions of dollars in past settlements and fines for failing to monitor suspicious orders of opioids.

Since 2008, McKesson has paid over $163 million for its failure to report suspicious orders, including a $150 million settlement with authorities in 2017, which is a record for a distributor.

In the same period Cardinal has paid nearly $100 million in multiple actions relating to its improper management and distribution of opioids to pharmacies across the United States.

In one instance authorities discovered that Cardinal’s own investigator had warned the company against selling opioids to four pharmacies in Florida that requested a 241% increase in supply in just two years. Despite the warning Cardinal failed to notify authorities and did not terminate the supply. Instead, shipments to the pharmacies increased.

AmerisourceBergen has paid $16 million as a result of prescription opioid diversion. In 2007, the company actually lost its license to send controlled substances from one of its distribution centers due to a lack of control over shipments of prescription opioids.

Today’s filing is the latest chapter in Oklahoma’s opiod crisis. Between 2006 and 2012, more than 1.4 billion opioid pills were distributed in the state; drug overdose deaths increased eightfold from 1999 to 2012, even surpassing car crash deaths in 2009; in 2012, Oklahoma had the fifth-highest unintentional poisoning death rate and prescription opioids contributed to the majority of those deaths; in the years from 2013 to 2017, an average of 21 Oklahomans died every month from an unintentional prescription opioid overdose; in 2014, Oklahoma’s unintentional poisoning rate was more than double the national rate.

Oklahoma leads the nation in non-medical use of painkillers, with nearly 5% of the population ages 12 and older abusing or misusing painkillers. In 2017, prescriptions for opioids were dispensed at a rate of 479 prescriptions per hour, enough for every adult in Oklahoma to have the equivalent of 156 pills.

A report by the Attorney General’s office re the economic cost of the opioid crisis can be accessed at: http://www.oag.ok.gov/Websites/oag/images/Studies%20Related%20to%20the%20Economic%20Cost%20of%20the%20Opioid%20Crisis.pdf

The petition filed in court today can be viewed at: http://www.oag.ok.gov/Websites/oag/images/2020-01-13%20Petition.pdf