Mallinckrodt & Purdue Pharmaceuticals & Dopesick on Hulu
I could've put this under business, but the focal point is addiction; and addiction is a Public Health issue. You know, Big Tobacco does the same thing ... make their product 'addictive' and dump billions into advertising & marketing.
I also signed up for Hulu to watch the mini series [great marketing Hulu]
there is also the book ...
Sad part, is that it's a true story
~~~
Purdue Pharma
Description
CEO: Craig Landau (Jun 22, 2017–)
Revenue: 3 billion USD (2017)
Founded: 1892
Number of employees: 5,000 (worldwide)
Competitors
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Ranking
Director salary
Purdue Pharma, the maker of the highly addictive painkiller OxyContin, was dissolved on Wednesday in a wide-ranging bankruptcy settlement that will require the company's owners, members of the Sackler family, to turn over billions of dollars of their fortune to address the deadly opioid epidemic. Sep 2, 2021
Judge conditionally approves Purdue Pharma opioid settlement
A federal bankruptcy judge gave conditional approval Wednesday to a sweeping settlement that will remove the Sackler family from ownership of OxyContin maker Purdue Pharma and devote potentially $10 billion to fighting the opioid crisis that has killed a half-million Americans over the past two decades.
If it withstands appeals, the deal will resolve a mountain of 3,000 lawsuits from state and local governments, Native American tribes, unions and others that accuse the company of helping to spark the overdose epidemic by aggressively marketing the prescription painkiller.
Under the settlement, the Sacklers will have to get out of the opioid business altogether and contribute $4.5 billion. But they will be shielded from any future lawsuits over opioids.
The drugmaker itself will be reorganized into a new charity-oriented company with a board appointed by public officials and will funnel its profits into government-led efforts to prevent and treat addiction.
Also, the settlement sets up a compensation fund that will pay some victims of drugs an expected $3,500 to $48,000 each.
After an all-day hearing in which he analyzed the plan’s pros and cons for a nonstop 6 1/2 hours, U.S. Bankruptcy Judge Robert Drain said he would approve it as long as two relatively small changes were made. If so, he said, he will formally enter the decision on Thursday.
He said that while he does not have “fondness for the Sacklers or sympathy for them,” collecting money from them through lawsuits instead of a settlement would be complicated.
The deal comes nearly two years after the Stamford, Connecticut-based company filed for bankruptcy under the weight of the lawsuits.
Under the settlement, the Sacklers were not given immunity from criminal charges, though there have been no indications they will face any.
State and local governments came to support the plan overwhelmingly, if grudgingly in many cases. But nine states and others had opposed it, largely because of the protections granted to the family.
The attorneys general of Connecticut, the District of Columbia and Washington state immediately announced they will either appeal the ruling or explore the possibility of doing so.
The Sacklers “should not be allowed to manipulate bankruptcy laws to evade justice and protect their blood money,” Connecticut’s William Tong said.
Some families who lost loved ones to drugs also came out against the settlement, including Ed Bisch, of Westampton, New Jersey, whose 18-year-old son died of an overdose nearly 20 years ago. “The Sacklers are buying their immunity,” he said.
But other families said they did not want to risk losing the money that will go toward treatment and prevention.
“If they gave me a million dollars, would it help bring back my son?” said Lynn Wencus, of Wrentham, Massachusetts. “Let’s help the people who are really struggling with this disease.”
In a statement, members of the Sackler family said: “While we dispute the allegations that have been made about our family, we have embraced this path in order to help combat a serious and complex public health crisis.”
Purdue chairman Steve Miller said the settlement averts “years of value-destructive litigation” and “ensures that billions of dollars will be devoted to helping people and communities who have been hurt by the opioid crisis.”
The bankruptcy judge, based in White Plains, New York, had urged the holdouts to work out an agreement for the same reason.
“Bitterness over the outcome of this case is completely understandable,” Drain said. “But one also has to look at the process and the issues and risks and rewards and alternatives of continued litigation versus the settlement laid out in the plan.”
Some of the opioid deaths over the past two decades have been attributed to OxyContin and other prescription painkillers, but most are from illicit forms of opioids such as heroin and illegally produced fentanyl. Opioid-linked deaths in the U.S. continued at a record pace last year, hitting 70,000.
The crisis devastated the reputation of the Sackler family, major philanthropists whose name was once emblazoned on the walls of museums and universities around the world. With the settlement, family members who have owned the company will still be worth billions. Another branch of the Sackler family has had no involvement with Purdue for decades.
Whether the deal holds the Sacklers sufficiently accountable was the most contentious question through the proceedings. Those suing succeeded in boosting the amount the Sacklers would pay from a likely $3 billion.
David Sackler, a former Purdue board member, had testified that family members would not accept the agreement unless it protected them from lawsuits. Otherwise, he said, the family would defend itself in litigation that could drag on for years and eat up the company’s and the family’s assets in lawyers’ fees.
His father, Richard Sackler, a former Purdue president and board chairman, said under questioning that he, his family and the company did not bear responsibility for the opioid crisis.
Drain noted that none of the four Sacklers who testified offered an explicit apology. “A forced apology is not really an apology, so we will have to live without one,” he said.
The judge requested two somewhat technical changes to the plan: one clarifying that Sackler family members would be protected only from lawsuits involving opioids, and one on the procedure for bringing non-opioid claims against them.
One projection commissioned by a group of attorneys general found that the family’s wealth could rise from the current estimate of $10.7 billion to more than $14 billion by 2030 despite the required payments. That’s because the family could continue to benefit from investment returns and interest as they make their gradual contributions over a decade under the deal.
Lawyers for Purdue and branches of the Sackler family disputed the assumptions used in the projection.
The settlement also requires members of the Sackler family, who are scattered across the U.S., Britain and elsewhere in Europe, to get out of the opioid business worldwide.
Several attorneys general won another provision that will create a massive public repository of company documents, including ones that normally would be protected by attorney-client privilege.
Purdue has said the settlement overall will be worth about $10 billion, which includes the value of addiction treatment and overdose antidote drugs it is developing.
The bankruptcy case is not the first time Purdue had faced legal trouble over the marketing of its painkillers.
The company pleaded guilty in 2007 to federal charges it misled regulators and others about the addiction dangers of OxyContin and agreed to pay more than $600 million in penalties.
Last November, as part of a settlement with the U.S. Justice Department, Purdue pleaded guilty to conspiring to defraud the United States and violating anti-kickback laws.
Purdue’s bankruptcy has been the highest-profile case in a complicated universe of opioid litigation.
Drugmaker Johnson & Johnson and the three largest U.S. drug distribution companies recently announced a settlement that could be worth up to $26 billion if state and local governments agree.
Individual trials also remain, including one scheduled to start in October in Cleveland over the role pharmacies played in the crisis. Other trials have been held this year in California, New York and West Virginia, though verdicts have yet to be reached.
[Proof that evil exists and that what I think happened with BPD, indeed did; lies and a cover up, at any cost. Everyone involved lied and now I am being killed; suffering every waking moment, drugged by the helicopter so that I am in too much pain to sleep. WTF?
Thankfully, people like Det. Diaz make BS remarks to me, implicating the lies and fabricated evidence my file. It was him that implied I was like Amy in Gone Girl. Ummm, BTW & FYI, I have done nothing gnarly my entire fucking life EVER!!!! But thanks, for letting the cat out of the bag. Mike, BPD, Bishara, Bass ... you're all liars. SMH
What is Purdue Pharma called now?
As part of the settlement, Purdue Pharma filed for bankruptcy in Sept. 2019; it will be transformed into a public benefit corporation. The Sackler family will also sell its U.K.-based subsidiary, Mundipharma. Proceeds from the sale will go towards the settlement.
The DOJ Moves To Block The Purdue Pharma Bankruptcy Deal That Shields The Sacklers
A division of the Justice Department that serves as a watchdog over the federal bankruptcy system filed an appeal late Wednesday seeking to block the controversial Purdue Pharma bankruptcy plan.
William Harrington, who serves as U.S. trustee for the Justice Department, also filed documents requesting an "expedited stay" to prevent implementation of the settlement.
The deal, which Judge Robert Drain approved Sept. 1, granted sweeping immunity from opioid lawsuits to members of the Sackler family who own the drug company.
The Sacklers, who are not bankrupt, were granted releases from liability after agreeing to contribute roughly $4.3 billion of their private wealth to the deal.
Supporters of the settlement, including most state attorneys general, said it will avoid costly litigation while funding drug treatment programs over the next decade.
As Purdue Pharma Bankruptcy Nears Approval, Family Members Write About The Human Toll
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Family Members Write About The Human Toll Of The Opioid Epidemic
But throughout a two-week bankruptcy trial, and in court documents, the Justice Department repeatedly blasted releases from liability granted to the Sacklers as "unlawful" and "unconstitutional."
In an earlier filing, Harrington accused the Sacklers and their associates of using the bankruptcy system to avoid liability for "alleged wrongdoing in concocting and perpetuating for profit one of the most severe public health crises ever experienced in the United States."
The introduction of OxyContin in the 1990s is widely seen as one of the spurs of an opioid epidemic that has killed more than 500,000 people in the United States.
The Sacklers, who by their own reckoning earned more than $10 billion from opioid sales, have said repeatedly they did nothing wrong and acted ethically.
Black Opioid Deaths Increase Faster Than Whites, Spurring Calls For Treatment Equity
SHOTS - HEALTH NEWS
Black Opioid Deaths Increase Faster Than Whites, Spurring Calls For Treatment Equity
In new court documents filed Wednesday, attorneys for the Department of Justice signaled they are concerned some provisions of the Purdue Pharma bankruptcy plan might be implemented quickly, complicating an appeal.
"In seeking a stay pending appeal, the United States Trustee's objective is to preserve the status quo during the life of the appeal," the document said.
The Justice Department requested an expedited hearing within the next two weeks. The states of Maryland and Washington as well as Washington, D.C., also have filed appeals.
In approving the Purdue Pharma bankruptcy this month, the judge described it as the best possible resolution to a case involving more than 600,000 parties who say OxyContin harmed them.
"This is a bitter result," Drain said during his ruling on Sept. 1. "I believe that at least some of the Sackler parties have liability for those [opioid OxyContin] claims. ... I would have expected a higher settlement."
Purdue Pharma has twice pleaded guilty to federal crimes related to its marketing of OxyContin. The Sacklers who led the company said they did nothing criminal or unethical.
Under this deal, if it survives appeal, the Sacklers would again acknowledge no wrongdoing.
The Purdue Pharma Deal Would Deliver Billions, But Individual Payouts Will Be Small
The multibillion-dollar bankruptcy settlement with Purdue Pharma and the Sackler family is grounded in an opioid crisis that has injured or killed an untold number of Americans.
But many of the 138,000 individuals who've filed claims for a death, expenses tied to their addiction or the birth of a child exposed to opioids during pregnancy expect to receive little if anything from the deal.
For her claim, Lynn Wencus of Wretham, Mass., collected a long, painful thread of receipts for prescriptions, urine tests, doctors visits, detox and rehab stays. Now that paper trail will be converted to points on a chart created during the Purdue Pharma settlement. The points will determine how much her son Jeff's life was worth. He died after an opioid overdose in 2017.
The Sacklers, Who Made Billions From OxyContin, Win Immunity From Opioid Lawsuits
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The Sacklers, Who Made Billions From OxyContin, Win Immunity From Opioid Lawsuits
"There's no amount of money that would ease the pain or suffering that he went through, that my family went through," Lynn Wencus says. "But the chart — it's a spit in the face."
The maximum award for Jeff Wencus' death would be between $26,000 and $40,000. It could be 20% higher or lower, depending on the final settlement resolution. None of the amounts touch the more than $125,000 the Wencus family spent on Jeff's care. And they'll only get what's left after attorney and administrative fees as well as outstanding medical claims are paid — so possibly nothing.
"I knew awhile ago that the individual claimants were getting thrown aside in this bankruptcy case," Wencus says.
An emphasis on prevention rather than the past
About 90% of the settlement, which could deliver between $6 billion and $10 billion over time, will go to states, local governments and tribes. They're supposed to use it to fight the opioid crisis. University of Connecticut law school professor Alexandra Lahav says that ratio prioritizes the greater good, going forward.
"To me it shows an emphasis on how do we fix what is broken for the future," says Lahav, "versus people who were already hurt in the past."
As Purdue Pharma Bankruptcy Nears Approval, Family Members Write About The Human Toll
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As Purdue Pharma Bankruptcy Nears Approval, Family Members Write About The Human Toll
Lahav says she sympathizes with individuals who call the settlement unfair. That maximum payment for a death, in the range of $40,000, is a fraction of what other drugmakers have paid to settle lawsuits, according to attorneys who review such cases.
But this settlement is different because it was negotiated in bankruptcy court and there was a fixed pot of money. Lawyers representing individuals and all the states disagreed about how to divide it. Some attorneys who followed the proceedings say states had the advantage and prevailed.
Massachusetts Attorney General Maura Healey, one of the last AGs to sign the deal, says spending most of the money on prevention, treatment and recovery means it will reach people who could not or did not sue Purdue.
The DOJ Moves To Block The Purdue Pharma Bankruptcy Deal That Shields The Sacklers
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The DOJ Moves To Block The Purdue Pharma Bankruptcy Deal That Shields The Sacklers
"So all of those families — and they are the vast, vast majority of families and individuals harmed by the crisis — they're going to be helped through what we were able to do," Healey says.
Sean Higgins, an attorney representing individuals, wrote in an emailed statement that using the money that is not going directly to victims to slow the opioid epidemic "is consistent with the victims' goal to prevent others from suffering the same plight."
A vote, but no real choice
That's why Wencus voted to approve the deal she calls an insult. Ryan Hampton, who's in recovery from an addiction to opioids, says "yes" was his only choice.
"Without it, victims would have received nothing," says Hampton, who co-chaired a committee that helped negotiate the settlement. "It felt like we were being held hostage."
Hampton resigned just before the deal was approved and has written a memoir about the bankruptcy proceedings. He only expects to qualify for the minimum payment, $3,500. His treatment bills totaled nearly $500,000, but Hampton says receipts that would prove a link to his Purdue painkillers are long gone.
"Many families across this country who actually lost loved ones are going to qualify probably for that minimum payout because they're having the exact same issues locating these records," Hampton says.
If the Purdue Sackler settlement survives appeals, individuals could see the first small checks late next year.
Hampton and Wencus say a lot of what bothers them about the settlement seems rooted in discrimination.
"There is still so much stigma associated with substance use disorder," Wencus says, "and there are still many, many people who believe it's not a disease, it's a choice."
That's a perception that money flowing into treatment and prevention could help correct.
Kathy Strain has been battling that perception for decades. She'll file a claim for a grandchild exposed to opioids in the womb. Guardians often don't know the extent of the hearing, vision or learning deficits these children may face. Strain says she's already spent much more than the $7,000 to $10,000 maximum award she might receive for neonatal abstinence syndrome. But Strain says she's done with the court fight.
"It's time to get this done and over with, get this money into our communities," says Strain, who works in drug use prevention programs. "We need resources today, not five years from now."
Appeals are mounting in Purdue Pharma bankruptcy settlement
Prosecutors reach landmark $26 billion opioid settlement with drug companies
The settlement comes after overdose deaths hit a record high 93,000 last year.
The Associated Press
Objections to a historic settlement with Purdue Pharma are mounting in the form of appeals, with Rhode Island's attorney general saying Wednesday the plan doesn't hold the OxyContin maker or its owners accountable for its role in sparking the opioid crisis.
Rhode Island appealed Tuesday in U.S. Bankruptcy Court in New York. Separate appeals have already been filed by the U.S. Bankruptcy Trustee, California, Connecticut, the District of Columbia, Maryland and Washington state, plus some Canadian local governments and other Canadian entities.
Any successful appeal could undo the deal, not just that state’s piece of it.
Rhode Island Attorney General Peter Neronha, a Democrat, said he doesn't accept that the resolution between Purdue Pharma and thousands of state and local governments is sufficient. The Sackler family has not been transparent about its wealth, he said, so it's difficult to calculate how much punishment any resolution will inflict.
Estimates have put the collective wealth of family members who own the company at over $10 billion.
Neronha also said he dislikes that the settlement protects the Sacklers from lawsuits over opioids.
The state would be entitled to an estimated $21.6 million over nine years, or about $2.4 million annually, he said.
“It's just not a lot,” Neronha said. “It may sound like a lot, I guess, but it's not a lot, given the scope of the problem, both past, present and future.”
A federal bankruptcy judge approved a plan this month to turn Purdue, based in Stamford, Connecticut, into a new company no longer owned by members of the Sackler family, with its profits going to fight the opioid epidemic.
The deal resolves some 3,000 lawsuits filed by state and local governments, Native American tribes, unions, hospitals and others who claimed the company’s marketing of prescription opioids helped spark and continue an overdose epidemic.
Company profits and $4.5 billion in cash and charitable assets from members of the Sackler family will be used to pay some individual victims and help fund opioid treatment and prevention programs.
Members of the Sackler family have said that while they dispute the allegations made about their family, they “embraced this path in order to help combat a serious and complex public health crisis.”
Purdue has said the settlement averts “years of value-destructive litigation” and ensures that billions of dollars will be used to help people and communities hurt by the opioid crisis. Phone messages left with their lawyers Wednesday were not immediately returned.
Rhode Island's case against opioid makers is scheduled for trial in state court in January. But the state's claim and all others against Purdue were put on pause when the company filed for bankruptcy two years ago. The state's only hope of being able to move ahead with a claim against the company would be winning an appeal.
The new Hulu limited series Dopesick
... adapts Beth Macy’s investigative bestseller about the causes of the opioid epidemic — and, specifically, the role that the family-run Purdue Pharma company and its chairman, Richard Sackler (Michael Stuhlbarg) played in getting America hooked on OxyContin. Pharma execs and sales reps insisted that the painkiller was both nonaddictive and long-lasting. Neither claim proved true, a fact that Sackler and his underlings tried to conceal by insisting that the drug’s failures were actually signs of patients suffering “breakthrough pain.” The only treatment for that condition, they said? You guessed it — even more OxyContin, which only decreased the medication’s effectiveness and increased its addictive qualities, on and on, until whole communities were being destroyed.
This is, unfortunately, the narrative philosophy of Dopesick itself. In isolated moments, the miniseries functions exactly as prescribed, offering a devastating portrait of how Purdue helped turn us into, as DEA agent Bridget Meyer (Rosario Dawson) puts it, “a pill-popping zombie nation.” More often, though, the drama’s emotional impact fades too quickly, and chief writer and producer Danny Strong (Empire) attempts to compensate by doubling the dosage. Individual episodes feel too long, and Dopesick as a whole seems to have no business lasting eight-plus hours, repeating various logistical and thematic details again and again with diminished effectiveness each time.
Strong becomes the latest prestige-TV creator to fall in love with nonlinear storytelling to his own detriment. Dopesick bounces around from 1996, when Purdue put OxyContin on the market, through two federal investigations into the drug’s effect on society that unfold over the course of a decade. One is Meyer’s DEA operation; the other involves Virginia prosecutors Rick Mountcastle (Peter Sarsgard in a really distracting wig) and Randy Ramseyer (John Hoogenakker), who eventually learn that Bridget already tried and failed to bust Purdue. Though Bridget attacks the problem from different angles than Rick and Randy do, shifting between the two cases creates a feeling of redundancy. And introducing Bridget after her attempt has crashed and burned undercuts every scene where she seems to be making progress. It’s meant to offer dramatic tension, and to illustrate just how invulnerable a corporation like Purdue can seem, but it doesn’t work. And good luck keeping track of the miniseries’ four timelines — one for each investigation, one for Richard Sackler, and one for Michael Keaton and Kaitlyn Dever as two victims of the crisis — without a conspiracy board handy. As is usually the case, the fractured narrative creates more problems than it solves, making it harder to connect the dots from various Purdue tactics to the ways in which ordinary people are harmed by them. One episode opens with a chyron declaring that it’s one year later than the previous installment, but what does that mean in a story where the action is constantly scrolling between eras?
Keaton and Dever play fictional composite characters living in and around the coal mining industry. He’s Samuel Finnix, an idealized country doctor who knows all his patients and even makes house calls in the mid-Nineties. She’s one of those patients, Betsy, a young woman hiding her sexuality from ultra-religious parents (played by Mare Winningham and Ray McKinnon) while joining the family business mining coal. Both are excellent, and a more effective example of Dopesick trying to put a human face on the epidemic than various sluggish scenes depicting the crumbling of Bridget’s marriage to Paul (Raúl Esparza). And the latter is still far preferable to anything with Richard Sackler, for whom Strong, Stuhlbarg, and Barry Levinson (who directed the early episodes) don’t seem to have a take beyond “sociopathic supervillain.” This may, in fact, be a fair assessment of a businessman who wreaked so much devastation in pursuit of profits — and, the series argues, in a misguided attempt to impress relatives who never much cared for him — but it’s much too simplistic and caricatured an approach to merit the amount of time devoted to him here. Still, even the subplots with Samuel and Betsy drag on too long and repeat certain ideas over and over ad nauseam.
The miniseries’ best scenes tend to involve Rick and Randy. They’re not especially dynamic characters, but in a way that helps the series along. Strong and his collaborators successfully use the pair to identify all the ways that Purdue managed to manipulate both federal regulators and the American medical establishment to put this intense, addictive drug into the medicine cabinets of people suffering from pain that was mild at worst. There’s a chilling scene where Randy winds up in the hospital for an unrelated medical issue and his doctor and nurses keep trying to talk him into taking OxyContin, despite his repeated protests. And as the two prosecutors untangle the web of corruption, favor-granting, and sloppiness that allowed Purdue to take OxyContin to market, Dopesick can at times take on the satisfying air of a Spotlight, about the Boston Globe’s expose of sex abuses in the Catholic church, or any dramatization of dogged investigators exposing the sins of establishment powers. There’s just not enough of that relative to everything else, including an unconvincing subplot about young Purdue sales rep Billy Cutler (Will Poulter) developing qualms about the product even as his wicked colleague Amber (Phillipa Soo) keeps telling him to relax and enjoy the spoils.
This is an important story, worth telling in the grand tradition of fact-based miniseries like And the Band Played On (about the AIDS crisis’ early days in San Francisco, to which which one character here compares the opioid explosion) or some of Strong’s past HBO projects like Recount and Game Change. Yet the approach here somehow leaves the tale feeling both too sprawling to be contained within only eight hours and too self-explanatory to require such a heavy course of treatment.
***
This drug company is the devil and they've already opened 3 new companies to keep making generics. I'll list the company names so you can boycott.
Bought the book. I am so angry about this and have so many questions as to how this could've happen. Dr. Bass, who took his life, also got caught up in this mess ...
He was also my Dr. and I believe he added things to my file to help the police cover up their mistake. No, I don't believe, I know he did. Burbank PD and hi worked together. I know Dr. Bass literally doctored up my file for the cops. He too, accused me of so much shit!
https://www.google.com/amp/s/www.latimes.com/socal/burbank-leader/news/tn-blr-xpm-2009-07-03-blr-doctor04-story.html%3f_amp=true
Mallinckrodt Pharmaceuticals
Their stock is 18 cents a share lol lol lol; serves you right!!
Mallinckrodt, represented by Latham & Watkins, filed for bankruptcy in October with $5.3 billion in funded debt to resolve widespread litigation brought by states, local governments and private individuals accusing it of deceptively marketing opioids. Jun 16, 2021
Shares of Mallinckrodt Plc [S: mnk] tumbled 31.2% in trading on Monday after the company said it had filed for Chapter 11 bankruptcy, in part due to a proposed billion-dollar settlement for its alleged role in the U.S. opioid crisis. Oct 12, 2020
[https://www.cnn.com/2020/10/12/investing/mallinckrodt-bankruptcy/index.html]
New York (CNN Business)Mallinckrodt Pharmaceuticals, facing billions of dollars in legal costs over its role in the nation's opiod crisis, filed for bankruptcy early Monday.
The largest generic opioid manufacturer in the United States is losing battles on multiple fronts. A recent court decision could force Mallinckrodt to pay hundreds of millions of dollars in higher rebates to state Medicaid programs for its best-selling drugs. Last year, the Justice Department filed suit against the company, charging that it knowingly paid illegal kickbacks as part of an elaborate scheme to make millions of dollars and stick the American taxpayer with the bill.
But the most expensive problem Mallinckrodt (MNK) faces are lawsuits charging it with helping to feed the nation's opiod crisis. In February, it reached an agreement in principle on a $1.6 billion settlement with attorneys general for 47 states and US territories.
The company said it intends to use bankruptcy to "provide a fair, orderly, efficient and legally binding mechanism" that provides for an amended proposed opioid claims settlement and a financial restructuring that would settle its other legal woes.
The Dublin, Ohio, based company had 3,400 employees as of the end of last year, and had revenue of $3.2 billion in 2019, but net losses of nearly $1 billion.
Last year another opioid maker, Purdue Pharma, filed for bankruptcy as it sought a settlement on claims against it for its role in the opioid crisis. The bankruptcy process allows companies to shed debt and other liabilities and stay in business.
***
What they did was tell everyone that their version of Oxycodone, was not addictive; that at most only 1 percent of those who would take their version would become addicted. I want to stop right now and say, how did their drug reps convince the medical community of this? [doctors, nurses, and pharmers]. Anyone in the field, including EMS & Fire can tell you that all pain medications can be adducting; it's just the nature of the beast ... Tylenol with codeine, Percodan, Morphine, Dilaudid, Vicodin [hydrocodone + Tylenol], OxyContin [oxycodone], Norco [(hydrocodone bitartrate and acetaminophen].
All the above drugs are addictive. So how did Mallinckrodt do it?? I am going to read the book and watch the miniseries. Do you know how many people became addicted from oxy, overdosed, overdosed & died? Thousands!! And Mallinckrodt intentionally sold the drug with the intent to get people hooked ... for the money, only for the money. Sound familiar?? Big tobacco has done the same thing by added hundreds of addicting chemicals to cigarettes. Ask someone from Africa and Europe and they will tell you that cigarettes in the US taste and smell like chemicals. Both groups of people, Mallinckrodt & Big Tobacco are nothing but mere street drug pushers.
The difference between oxycodone and hydrocodone:
This is going to get really technical, but the main difference between oxycodone and hydrocodone is that oxycodone has an extra oxygen atom. Also, oxycodone is synthesized from thebaine and is only used to alleviate pain, while hydrocodone is derived from codeine and can be used to relieve both pain and cough.
To combat an escalating opioid epidemic, the Drug Enforcement Administration trained its sights in 2011 on Mallinckrodt Pharmaceuticals, one of the nation’s largest manufacturers of the highly addictive generic painkiller oxycodone.
It was the first time the DEA had targeted a manufacturer of opioids for alleged violations of laws designed to prevent diversion of legal narcotics to the black market. And it would become the largest prescription-drug case the agency has pursued.
Ultimately, the DEA and federal prosecutors would contend that the company ignored its responsibility to report suspicious orders as 500 million of its pills ended up in Florida between 2008 and 2012 — 66 percent of all oxycodone sold in the state. Government investigators alleged in internal documents that the company’s lack of due diligence could have resulted in nearly 44,000 federal violations and exposed it to $2.3 billion in fines, according to confidential government records and emails obtained by The Washington Post.
But six years later, after four investigations that spanned five states, the government has taken no legal action against Mallinckrodt. Instead, the company has reached a tentative settlement with federal prosecutors, according to sources familiar with the discussions. Under the proposal, which remains confidential, Mallinckrodt would agree to pay a $35 million fine and admit no wrongdoing.
“Mallinckrodt’s response was that ‘everyone knew what was going on in Florida but they had no duty to report it,’ ” according to an internal summary of the case prepared by federal prosecutors and obtained by The Post.
The case shows how difficult it is for the government to hold a drug manufacturer responsible for the damage done by its product. DEA investigators appalled by rising overdose deaths said they worked for years to build the biggest case of their careers only to watch it falter on uncertain legal territory and in the face of stiff resistance from the company.
“They just weren’t taking this seriously, and people were dying,” said a former law enforcement official who spoke on the condition of anonymity because the case is pending. “People were dying all over the place. It wasn’t their kids, their wives, their husbands, their brothers. It was some hillbilly in Central Florida, so who cares?”
In a statement, a Mallinckrodt spokesman said the company has worked hard to fight drug diversion.
“Mallinckrodt has long been a recognized leader in developing and sharing best practices related to the prevention of opioid diversion and misuse, and has continuously invested significant resources to address this serious drug epidemic,” the statement said. “We are proud of the programs and initiatives we’ve developed to ensure appropriate use of pain medication and, most importantly, to deter such medications from ending up in the wrong hands.”
Officials at the DEA declined to comment for this article. The U.S. attorney’s office in Detroit, which is handling the case, issued a statement. “Our office works diligently to use all the legal tools available to us to hold corporations responsible for their actions,” acting U.S. attorney Daniel Lemisch said. “This is particularly true in a highly regulated industry such as the manufacture of opioids. As this case is still in settlement negotiations, we cannot comment on the specifics of the matter.”
~~~
Dublin-based Mallinckrodt is on its way to completing its chapter 11 reorganization, necessitated by opioid-related litigation. (Fierce Pharma)
[https://www.fiercepharma.com/pharma/crippled-by-opioid-crisis-litigation-mallinckrodt-settlement-brings-company-closer-to]
This has been a summer of reckoning for many companies that aggressively marketed opioids while downplaying their addictive power.
For Mallinckrodt, which filed for bankruptcy last October, the company is one step closer to reorganization, as it revealed it has reached settlements with creditors that would reduce the company’s debt by roughly $1.3 billion, Mallinckrodt said.
RELATED: Mallinckrodt files for bankruptcy, unveils $1.9B in opioid and Acthar settlements
Backers of the reorganization now include holders of 84% of the company’s unsecured notes, lenders holding $1.3 billion in outstanding loans and two organized groups of entities with opioid-related claims against the company.
“With this additional support, we are continuing to build consensus for our restructuring plan,” company CEO Mark Trudeau said in a release. “The support of these important stakeholder groups reinforces our confidence that this is the best path forward for Mallinckrodt and its creditors, enabling us to preserve value.”
In October of last year, Mallinckrodt agreed to a $1.6 billion settlement with 47 states and territories to resolve claims over its role in the opioid crisis. It also agreed to pay the U.S. government $260 million to absolve a claim that it underpaid rebates on Acthar Gel, a hormone treatment to relieve inflammation.
RELATED: Mallinckrodt investors stream for the exits as opioid-tied bankruptcy talks mount
A bankruptcy court will hold a confirmation hearing later this month to consider approval of Mallinckrodt’s restructuring. If okayed, the company said it expects the reorganization to take between 90 and 150 days.
Bankruptcy has become a common tactic for companies that profited from the opioid crisis. Earlier this week, a bankruptcy court in New York approved Purdue Pharma’s $4.5 billion settlement, which excuses the company from future opioid litigation. Some states say they will appeal the result.
Another company, Insys Therapeutics, filed for bankruptcy in 2019 and saw its founder, John Kapoor, convicted of a scheme to bribe doctors to prescribe opioids and defraud insurers into paying for them.
In July, Johnson & Johnson and distributors Cardinal Health, AmerisourceBergen and McKesson agreed to a $26 billion settlement to shield them from future litigation in a deal yet to be finalized.
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Okay, so Mallinckrodt make thousands of generics; I don't take generics but if I did I would specifically tell the Pharmer that you want nothing from Mallinckrodt.
They own SpecGx, who also manufactures generics. Don't buy from them either. These smaller companies were created to offset their billion dollar lawsuit.
Oh my Gawd .... [look, this company deserves NOTHING after what they did, Jesus!]
Read the book and watch the mini series. Educate yourself!! Common sense should've stopped this company. I am pretty sure if I line up the active ingredients, the mechanics of how the drug works [pharmacokinetics & pharmacology that oxy would match all the drugs in its class that are known to be addictive. For myself I need to find out what they did and how they did it with no one questioning their agenda. I wouldn't have believed it, because I know a lot about drugs [not like that, but if you convo with me you'll learn that I do].
This could've been Mallory. She told me that she did everything but Heroin, Jesus Christ!! She will be 8 years sober this month, by the grace of God, she gave up everything, including tobacco at the same time she stopped alcohol & drugs! Do you know how blessed and fortunate she is? Yea, and she is hardcore, too. She works a mean 12-step program. So proud of you Mal 😭
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SUBSIDIARIES OF MALLINCKRODT PLC
Name of Subsidiary | Jurisdiction of Formation | |
Acthar IP Unlimited Company | Ireland | |
Cache Holdings Limited | Bermuda | |
Carnforth Limited | Bermuda | |
Dritte CORSA Verwaltungsgesellschaft GmbH | Germany | |
Ikaria Australia Pty Ltd | Australia | |
Ikaria Canada Inc. | Canada | |
IMC Exploration Company | Maryland | |
Infacare Pharmaceutical Corporation | Delaware | |
INO Therapeutics LLC | Delaware | |
Ludlow Corporation | Massachusetts | |
MAK LLC | Delaware | |
Mallinckrodt APAP LLC | Delaware | |
Mallinckrodt ARD Finance LLC | Delaware | |
Mallinckrodt ARD Holdings Inc. | Delaware | |
Mallinckrodt ARD Holdings Limited | United Kingdom | |
Mallinckrodt ARD IP Limited | Ireland | |
Mallinckrodt ARD LLC | California | |
Mallinckrodt Brand Pharmaceuticals, Inc. | Delaware | |
Mallinckrodt Buckingham Unlimited Company | Ireland | |
Mallinckrodt Canada Cooperatie U.A. | Netherlands | |
Mallinckrodt Canada ULC | Alberta | |
Mallinckrodt CB LLC | Delaware | |
Mallinckrodt Chemical Holdings (U.K.) Limited | United Kingdom | |
Mallinckrodt Chemical Limited | United Kingdom | |
Mallinckrodt Critical Care Finance LLC | Delaware | |
Mallinckrodt Enterprises Holdings, Inc. | California | |
Mallinckrodt Enterprises LLC | Delaware | |
Mallinckrodt Enterprises UK Limited | United Kingdom | |
Mallinckrodt Equinox Finance Inc. | Delaware | |
Mallinckrodt Equinox Limited | United Kingdom | |
Mallinckrodt Finance Management Ireland Limited | Ireland | |
Mallinckrodt Group S.à r.l. | Luxembourg | |
Mallinckrodt Group S.à r.l., Luxembourg (LU) Schaffhausen Branch | Switzerland | |
Mallinckrodt Holdings GmbH | Switzerland | |
Mallinckrodt Hospital Products Inc. | Delaware | |
Mallinckrodt Hospital Products IP Limited | Ireland | |
Mallinckrodt Inc. | Delaware | |
Mallinckrodt International Finance SA | Luxembourg | |
Mallinckrodt International Holdings S. à r.l. | Luxembourg | |
Mallinckrodt IP Unlimited Company | Ireland | |
Mallinckrodt LLC | Delaware | |
Mallinckrodt Lux IP S.à r.l. | Luxembourg | |
Mallinckrodt Manufacturing LLC | Delaware | |
Mallinckrodt Medical Holdings (UK) Limited | United Kingdom | |
Mallinckrodt Medical Holdings (UK) Limited, Zweigniederlassung Deutschland (the German Branch) | Germany | |
Mallinckrodt Netherlands B.V. | Netherlands | |
Mallinckrodt Petten Holdings B.V. | Netherlands | |
Mallinckrodt Pharma IP Trading Designated Activity Company | Ireland | |
Mallinckrodt Pharma K.K. | Japan | |
Mallinckrodt Pharmaceuticals Ireland Limited | Ireland | |
Mallinckrodt Pharmaceuticals Limited | United Kingdom | |
Mallinckrodt Quincy S.à r.l. | Luxembourg | |
Mallinckrodt SAG Holdings GmbH | Switzerland | |
Mallinckrodt Securitization S.à r.l. | Luxembourg | |
Mallinckrodt UK Finance LLP | United Kingdom | |
Mallinckrodt UK Ltd | United Kingdom | |
Mallinckrodt US Holdings Inc. | Nevada | |
Mallinckrodt US Holdings LLC | Delaware | |
Mallinckrodt US Pool LLC | Nevada | |
Mallinckrodt Veterinary, Inc. | Delaware | |
Mallinckrodt Windsor Ireland Finance Unlimited Company | Ireland | |
Mallinckrodt Windsor S.à r.l. | Luxembourg | |
MCCH Inc. | Delaware | |
MEH, Inc. | Nevada | |
MHP Finance LLC | Delaware | |
MKG Medical UK Ltd | United Kingdom | |
MNK 2011 Inc. | Delaware | |
Montjeu Limited | Ireland | |
MUSHI UK Holdings Limited | United Kingdom | |
OCERA Therapeutics, Inc. | Delaware | |
Petten Holdings Inc. | Delaware | |
Profibrix B.V. | Netherlands | |
Questcor International Limited | Ireland | |
Sonorant Therapeutics Limited | Ireland | |
SpecGx Holdings LLC | New York | |
SpecGx LLC | Delaware | |
ST Shared Services LLC | Delaware | |
Stratatech Corporation | Delaware | |
Sucampo Acquisitions GmbH | Switzerland | |
Sucampo GmbH | Switzerland | |
Sucampo Pharma Americas LLC | Delaware | |
Sucampo Pharma, LLC | Japan | |
Sucampo Pharmaceuticals, Inc. | Delaware | |
Sucampo, LLC | Delaware | |
Therakos (Belgium) SPRL | Belgium | |
Therakos (Canada) Company | Nova Scotia | |
Therakos (France) SAS | France | |
Therakos (Italia) S.r.l. | Italy | |
Therakos (UK) Limited, Dutch Branch | Netherlands | |
Therakos (UK), Limited, Sucursal en Espana | Spain | |
Therakos (UK), Ltd | United Kingdom | |
Therakos (UK), Ltd (Prywatna Spólka Z Ograniczona Odpowiedzialnoscia) Oddzial W Polsce | Poland | |
Therakos (UK), Ltd, Sweden Filial | Sweden | |
Therakos EMEA Limited | Ireland | |
Therakos Europe Limited | Ireland | |
Therakos Germany GmbH | Germany | |
Therakos, Inc. | Florida | |
Vtesse Inc. | Delaware | |
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