Drug firms sued over opioid marketing

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KnowCents Medicolegal

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Staff Writers

Five US drug manufacturers are being sued amid claims they overstated the benefits of prescription opioids

Five major pharmaceutical manufacturers in the US are being sued amid claims they overstated the benefits, and trivialised the addictive qualities, of prescription opioid painkillers.

The lawsuit is being brought by the attorney-general of the state of Ohio and alleges that an intentional misrepresentation of the risks posed by the drugs, including OxyContin and Percocet, has contributed to a worsening opioid addiction epidemic.

The companies being sued are Purdue Pharma; Endo Health Solutions; Teva Pharmaceutical Industries, and its subsidiary, Cephalon; Johnson & Johnson and its subsidiary Janssen Pharmaceuticals; and Allergan.

Opioid drugs, including prescription painkillers and heroin, killed more than 33,000 people in the United States in 2015, more than any year on record, according to data from the US Centers for Disease Control and Prevention.

In Ohio last year, 2.3 million residents were prescribed opioids, nearly a fifth of the state’s population, which in in turn helped fuel heroin abuse, State Attorney General Mike DeWine said.

“This lawsuit is about justice, it’s about fairness, it’s about what is right,” Mr DeWine said. “These drug companies knew that what they were doing was wrong and they did it anyway.”

The drug companies are fighting the charges, with one saying the allegations are “legally and factually unfounded”.

A spokeswoman for Janssen said the company had acted responsibly regarding its opioid pain medications, which were approved by the FDA and carried mandated risk warnings on their labels.

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Lou Lewis
Lou Lewis
7 years ago

Very interesting article , but what has surprised me is that it has taken this long for someone in power to actually take on these distributors of drugs of addiction ( no, not the South American cartels). Nearly every second or third ad on some of our medical websites are for the new and improved opioids and other narcotics that are going to change the way of life of many people with side-effects so low as to be negligible. My god, we are made to appear almost negligent in the treatment of our patients if we do not prescribe these new analgesics, which are, according to their manufacturers, not evil or even addictive. This does sound very much like the tobacco companies when they were trying to defend their killer product using pretty much the same arguments that the drug companies today are using in this latest stoush in the United States of America.
Ask any GP the following question, namely, what is the worst part of your job? Without doubt the majority of GPs will say it is all these doctor shoppers or druggies doing the rounds of surgeries trying to get this so-called essential medication and disrupting the running of your general practice, even scaring a lot of your patients ,whilst they are agitated in your waiting room .
And let’s not forget that nearly every patient who is discharged from the hospital is is no longer given di-gesic or Panadeine forte for their post-operative pain and as such a normal happy young footballer is suddenly transformed into a prescription drug addicted doctor shopper, and their post instructions are to go to your local GP who will take over the management of your pain medication regime, even though the damage has already been done.
I have personally seen this happen to a lot of my patients over the years and the problem seems to be escalating rather than declining even though we, the GP, know that people who originally prescribed the drugs do not have a clue as to the social disaster they are causing and they are, usually inadvertently, aiding and abetting these legitimate drug companies peddling their addictive drugs, all in the name of their drugs being better than the less -addictive medications of the past.
In other words, putting profit ahead of health. I don’t usually’ attack’ pharmaceutical companies but the irresponsible way that these drugs of addiction are being peddled leaves me no choice but to also speak up against this massive swing to the use of these drugs which are causing untold misery for everyone involved with such a drug addicted patient, whether it be as a doctor, as a friend or as a family member.
regards
Lou

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