Morning Briefing
Summaries of health policy coverage from major news organizations
The Opioid Reckoning: It's Rare To Hold Directors Liable For Corporate Conduct, But Sacklers May Prove To Be Exception
Stat: Report: Sacklers Controlled Purdue Like The Godfather Controlled The Mafia
As more lawsuits accuse Purdue Pharma of fomenting the opioid crisis, the Sackler family that controls the drug maker is increasingly being targeted, since some members were directors and executives for many years. But while holding directors liable for corporate conduct is rare, the points raised in an expert report filed in a case brought by the state of Utah may provide clues for winning the argument. (Silverman, 8/22)
The Washington Post: Babies Born After Opioid Exposure Deserve Legal Recognition, Lawyers Argue
With a nationwide prescription opioid lawsuit scheduled for trial in two months, attorneys for newborns suffering from exposure to opioids in the womb have made a last-ditch plea for special legal treatment for the infants and their guardians. Attorneys representing a group that may number more than 250,000 children have spent much of the past two years seeking a separate trial against drug companies but have been rebuffed twice by the judge who oversees the sprawling legal case. The children are still included in that lawsuit, along with about 2,000 other plaintiffs, against some two dozen defendants from the pharmaceutical industry. (Bernstein, 8/22)
Bloomberg: Ohio Balks At Endo, Allergan Opioid Deals As Trial Approaches
Ohio’s top law-enforcement official warned Endo International Plc and Allergan Plc he hasn’t agreed to back their proposals for settlements totaling about $16 million to avoid trials in the first federal cases to be heard by juries over the public-health crisis caused by opioid painkillers. Ohio Attorney General Dave Yost said in separate letters to the drug companies that their tentative deals with two counties in the state won’t resolve the state’s allegations that Endo and Allergan wrongfully marketed their opioid-based pain medicines. (Feeley and Doherty, 8/22)
NPR: How Journalists Mined DEA Opioid Records To Uncover Corporate Painkiller Pushing
Nearly 2,000 cities, towns and counties across America are currently participating in a massive multidistrict civil lawsuit against the opioid industry for damages related to the abuse of prescription pain medication. The defendants in the suit include drug manufacturers like Mallinckrodt, wholesale distributors McKesson and Cardinal Health, and pharmacy chains CVS and Walgreens. Evidence related to the lawsuit was initially sealed, but The Washington Post and the Charleston Gazette-Mail successfully sued to have it made public. (Davies, 8/22)
Boston Globe: A Moon Shot For The Opioid Crisis
Hundreds of lives could be saved in the 16 participating communities in Massachusetts as a result of this grant; ultimately, many more lives in other states will be saved if new services developed by clinical innovators are delivered to people who are addicted to opioids. But it will be challenging. Dr. Alex Walley, director of BMC’s Addiction Medicine Fellowship Program, compares the effort to the Apollo moon project, for which the goal to land a man on the moon was announced before the required rocket had been invented. If the study achieves its goals, it will be worth the cost. (Samet, 8/23)
Modern Healthcare: Opioid Abuse Treatment Rates Far Higher In Medicaid Expansion States
The rate of buprenorphine prescriptions for treatment of opioid use disorder among Medicaid patients was far higher on average in Medicaid expansion states than non-expansion states, a new Urban Institute study found. Between 2011 and 2018, Medicaid prescriptions for buprenorphine maintenance treatment per 1,000 enrollees jumped from 40 to 138 in states that expanded Medicaid to low-income adults under the Affordable Care Act. In non-expansion states, the rate increased from 16 to 41. That includes the combination buprenorphine-naloxone form of medication-assisted treatment. (Meyer, 8/22)
Kaiser Health News: Addiction Clinics Market Pricey, Unproven Treatments To Desperate Patients
Jason was hallucinating. He was withdrawing from drugs at an addiction treatment center near Indianapolis, and he had hardly slept for several days. “He was reaching for things, and he was talking to Bill Gates and he was talking to somebody else I’m just certain he hasn’t met,” his mother, Cheryl, says. She remembers finding Jason lying on the floor of the treatment center in late 2016. “I would just bring him blankets because they didn’t have beds or anything.” (Harper, 8/23)
Seattle Times: Prizes For Sobriety: As Washington Meth Use Rises, This Treatment Is One Of Few That Works
As a new wave of methamphetamine crashes over Washington, bigger than it’s been for decades, public health officials have struggled to spread an intervention for meth addiction that’s as effective as medication-assisted treatment has been for people using opioids. Contingency management, researchers like [Michael] McDonell say, is that thing: It works, patients like it, and it’s cost-effective. Literature reviews and analyses often agree: A review of 69 reports released from 2009 to 2014 found “high levels of treatment efficacy” in contingency-management treatment. On average, it increased a patient’s odds of reaching abstinence by 117%. (Greenspan, 8/22)
