OxyContin Maker Faces Fresh Round Of Lawsuits From 5 More States Over Opioid Epidemic

The Associated Press: 5 States Announce New Suits Over Prescription Opioids
Five more state attorneys general announced legal filings Thursday seeking to hold the company that makes OxyContin responsible for an opioid addiction crisis that's now the leading cause of accidental deaths across the country and in many states. The company, Connecticut-based Purdue Pharma, blasted the claims, saying they're based on "stunningly overbroad legal theories, which if adopted by courts, will undermine the bedrock legal principle of causation." (Izaguirre and Mulvihill, 5/16)

Reuters: Five More U.S. States Sue OxyContin Maker Purdue Pharma Over Opioid Epidemic
The lawsuits were announced six days after a North Dakota judge dismissed that state's lawsuit accusing Purdue Pharma of overstating the benefits and trivializing the addiction risks of prolonged opioid use. North Dakota is expected to appeal. Purdue Pharma called the new lawsuits "misleading attacks," and said it will defend itself against them. (Stempel, 5/16)

The Washington Post: Five More States Take Legal Action Against Purdue Pharma For Opioid Crisis
“Even when it became apparent that thousands of people were dying of opioid abuse, Purdue doubled down by continuing its relentless and deceptive campaign” to persuade doctors to write prescriptions for OxyContin, Morrisey said. Maryland Attorney General Brian Frosh said his state’s efforts were based on “two foundational falsehoods” that Purdue promoted widely: That the risk of becoming addicted to Purdue’s drug was very low and that under-treating pain could cause great harm. (Bernstein, 5/16)

The Wall Street Journal: Purdue Pharma Hit With Fresh Round Of Opioid Lawsuits
Prescription opioid overdoses killed 217,530 people in the U.S. from 1999 to 2017, according to the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention. Total opioid-related deaths in that period reached nearly 400,000. A Purdue spokesman on Thursday denied the new allegations, calling them “stunningly overbroad legal theories.” He said the lawsuits “are part of a continuing effort to try these cases in the court of public opinion rather than the justice system.” All told, 44 states and another 1,700 local municipalities and Native American tribes have brought claims against the makers and distributors of prescription opioids. (Randazzo, 5/16)

Milwaukee Journal Sentinel: Wisconsin Sues OxyContin Makers Purdue Pharma, Richard Sackler
The makers of the powerful and addictive painkiller OxyContin used deceptive marketing to persuade doctors to prescribe the opioid that contributed to a national epidemic of addiction, a lawsuit filed by Wisconsin Attorney General Josh Kaul alleges. Wisconsin is one of a handful of states that filed lawsuits this week alleging Purdue Pharma and Richard Sackler — creators of the drug — peddled false information to downplay the risky side effects of using OxyContin to kill pain and inflated the drug's benefits. (Beck, 5/16)

Bloomberg: Purdue Is Sued By Five More States Over OxyContin Marketing 
Purdue Pharma LP and its billionaire owners are being sued by five more states alleging the company’s aggressive marketing of the OxyContin painkiller triggered a vast addiction epidemic that has claimed hundreds of thousands of lives in the U.S. The attorneys general of Maryland, Wisconsin, Iowa, West Virginia and Kansas announced the latest suits on Thursday in a joint statement. Filed by both Republicans and Democrats, the complaints add to a wave of litigation accusing Purdue and the Sackler family, which owns the company, of knowingly pushing doctors to prescribe OxyContin even for minor pain. (Larson and Feeley, 5/16)

In other news on the national drug crisis —

Reveal: Drug Rehab Faces Investigations Into Labor Practices And Medicaid Fraud
State officials in Texas and Louisiana have launched multiple probes into the Cenikor Foundation following an investigation by Reveal that found the prominent drug rehab has turned patients into an unpaid labor force for private companies. Reveal from The Center for Investigative Reporting found that the nonprofit has sent thousands of patients to work without pay at hundreds of for-profit companies over the years – including Exxon, Shell and Walmart – in likely violation of federal labor law, according to former federal labor officials. (Walter, 5/16)

WBUR: Poll Finds Narrow Margin Of Support For Supervised Consumption Sites To Fight Opioid Epidemic In Massachusetts
Exactly half of Massachusetts voters support the idea of opening supervised consumption sites in the state. A WBUR poll found 43 percent oppose such clinics, where drug use is monitored to prevent or reverse an overdose. And 8% of 660 adults (topline results, crosstabs) declined to respond or were undecided. (Bebinger, 5/17)