Latest Drugs Headlines
All the headlines from our Drugs Topic Page, ordered by recency.
Report: Drug Addiction Cost West Virginia an Estimated $11B in 2019
Apr 5 2021 // Treating and addressing drug addiction cost West Virginia an estimated $11.3 billion in one year, according to a new report from the Center on Budget and Policy. The report, written by economist Jill Kriesky, says the...
Michigan’s McLaren to Pay $7.7M to Resolve Alleged Drug Violations
Jan 21 2021 // McLaren Health Care Corp. has agreed to pay the federal government more than $7.7 million to resolve alleged violations of provisions of the Controlled Substances Act. The civil settlement was announced by the U.S....
Drug Firms Win Court Bid Halting White House Rule Aimed at Lowering Drug Prices
Dec 28 2020 // A late-term maneuver by President Donald Trump to use lower drug prices paid overseas to limit some of Medicare’s own costs suffered a legal setback last Wednesday that appears likely to keep the policy from taking...
Walmart Denies U.S. Charges It Fueled Opioid Crisis by Filling ‘Illegitimate Prescriptions’
Dec 23 2020 // The U.S. Justice Department sued Walmart Inc. on Tuesday, accusing the world’s biggest retailer of fueling the opioid crisis in the United States, ignoring warning signs from its pharmacists and filling thousands of...
Babies Born Addicted to Opioids Can Sue Drug Makers: Tennessee High Court
Dec 22 2020 // The Tennessee Supreme Court has ruled that opioid producers can be sued under the state’s Drug Dealer Liability Act, allowing a lawsuit filed on behalf of children born dependent to opioids to move forward. The high...
Washington Drug Chain Settles over Invalid Prescriptions
Dec 21 2020 // The U.S. Department of Justice says it and Bartell Drugs have resolved allegations that the pharmacy chain filled invalid prescriptions between July 2016 and August 2020 in violation of the Controlled Substances Act. U.S....
Cyber Attack on EU Drug Regulator Has Not Disrupted Work on COVID-19 Vaccines
Dec 11 2020 // BRUSSELS – The head of the European Union drug regulator said on Thursday the agency’s work assessing COVID-19 vaccines had not been disrupted by a cyber attack that took place in the past two weeks. U.S. drugmaker...
U.S. Drug Advisory Panel Meets Today on Pfizer’s COVID Vaccine
Dec 10 2020 // A panel of outside advisers to the U.S. Food and Drug Administration is meeting on Thursday to weigh whether to recommend that the agency authorize Pfizer’s coronavirus vaccine for emergency use, one of the last...
Utah Pharmacy Sued Over Alleged Prescription Violations
Dec 9 2020 // Fedral prosecutors in Utah have sued a pharmacy after claiming employees allegedly filled hundreds of opioid prescriptions for members of the same family in the small city of Morgan. The state U.S. attorney’s office...
Market Value of Insurers, Drugstores Drops on Amazon Plans to Sell Prescription Drugs
Nov 17 2020 // The leading drugstores, drug distributors and health insurers lost about $22 billion in market value Tuesday after Amazon.com Inc. revealed plans to start selling prescription drugs to its Prime members in the U.S. The...
California Health Group Settling for $31.5M Over Drug Billing
Nov 4 2020 // A non-profit California health care chain will pay more than $31.5 million to settle allegations that it overbilled Medi-Cal for drugs bought through a federal program, authorities said. Memorial Health Services, based in...
Walmart Sues U.S. to Clarify Pharmacy Liability in Opioid Crisis
Oct 23 2020 // Walmart Inc. said on Thursday it had filed a lawsuit against the federal government, seeking clarity on the roles and legal responsibilities of pharmacists and pharmacies in filling opioid prescriptions. Walmart said...
Purdue Pharma to Plead Guilty Over Opioid Practices; Critics Balk at Terms
Oct 21 2020 // Purdue Pharma LP agreed to plead guilty to criminal charges over the handling of its addictive prescription opioid OxyContin, in a deal with U.S. prosecutors that effectively sidestepped paying billions of dollars in...
States Oppose U.S. Settlement with Purdue Over OxyContin
Oct 15 2020 // A group of 25 state attorneys general oppose a settlement of U.S. opioid probes being negotiated with Purdue Pharma LP and members of the wealthy Sackler family who own it, arguing the deal would improperly entangle state...
Facing Deceptive Opioid Marketing Suits, Mallinckrodt Files for Bankruptcy
Oct 12 2020 // Mallinckrodt Plc filed for bankruptcy protection on Monday, saddled with lawsuits alleging it fueled the U.S. opioid epidemic and after it lost a court battle to avoid paying higher rebates to state Medicaid programs for...
Steep Drop in California Workers’ Comp IMRs in First Half of 2020
Oct 5 2020 // The number of independent medical reviews used to resolve California workers’ compensation medical disputes fell sharply in the first half of 2020 as the pandemic took a toll on the state’s economy with...
Texas Staffing Firm Sued for Disability Discrimination
Sep 24 2020 // Federal officials have sued a Houston-based staffing firm over allegations of workplace disability discrimination. Swift Technical Services LLC, doing business as Airswift, a Houston-based staffing firm focused on the oil...
Report Shows Steep Drop in California Workers’ Comp IMRs in 1st Half Year
Sep 18 2020 // The number of independent medical reviews used to resolve California workers’ compensation medical disputes fell sharply in the first half of 2020 as the pandemic took a toll on the state’s economy with...
Inside Big Pharma’s Stealth War on Drug Price Watchdog: Reuters Special Report
Sep 11 2020 // As evidence grew this spring that the drug remdesivir was helping COVID-19 patients, some Wall Street investors bet on analysts’ estimates that its maker, Gilead Sciences Inc., could charge up to $10,000 for the...
Declarations
Sep 7 2020 // ‘Canary in the Coal Mine’ “In many ways, Louisiana is the poster child for climate change, we are the canary in the coal mine.” — Gov. John Bel Edwards, speaking at a Coastal Protection and...
