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Twenty one states have rejected an $18 billion settlement proposal from three major U.S. drug distributors to resolve lawsuits over their alleged role in the opioid crisis, but discussion are still active...More than 2,500 lawsuits have been brought nationwide by states, local and tribal governments over the toll the opioid crisis has taken on their communities...the states objected to a settlement offer sent to the companies’ law firms earlier this week, and were pushing for a larger payment...READ MORE

With federal prosecutors laying waste to Insys' executive team, one big domino was still left to fall: Founder and former CEO John Kapoor, who had a leading role in the drugmaker's opioid kickback scheme. Now, Kapoor will face a stiff prison sentence that sets the bar for executives in the opioid industry...A federal judge in Boston sentenced Kapoor...to five and a half years in prison for his role in a doctor kickback scheme to boost subscriptions of Subsys...READ MORE

The U.S. Supreme Court will hear a case brought by Arkansas Attorney General Leslie Rutledge against the pharmacy benefit management (PBM) industry…PBMs act as middlemen between health insurance companies and pharmacies...pharmacies have complained that PBMs have been reimbursing them below their cost to acquire a drug...U.S. Solicitor General Noel Francisco recommended Dec. 5 that the Arkansas case – Rutledge v. Pharmaceutical Care Management Association...be heard by the U.S. Supreme Court. Rutledge has argued that more than 16% of rural pharmacies closed in recent years due to declining PBM payments on generic prescriptions causing Arkansans to be unable to receive necessary medications...READ MORE

They were good sons with promising futures who died of drug overdoses less than two months before they were set to graduate from the University of Nevada, Reno...UNR seniors Jordan Watts and Ben Taylor died just 15 days apart in March 2019 from drugs laced with a fatal dose of fentanyl...Their mothers...say their sons were recreational users who bought a couple of pills, unaware they were tainted with the deadly opioid...The dealers pleaded guilty to drug and firearm charges that carry as much as 20 years in prison and fines of $10,000: Alec Donovan...Tyler Winters...Lucas Cueller...at least eight UNR students have died of drug overdoses in Washoe County since 2017...READ MORE

Walgreens has agreed to pay $7.5 million to settle a consumer protection lawsuit brought by California authorities who said the company employed an unlicensed pharmacist for more than a decade...The action is in response to a complaint filed by the district attorneys of Alameda and Santa Clara counties that alleges Kim Thien Le worked as a pharmacist in multiple Walgreens locations in the Bay Area for more than 10 years though she was not licensed by the Board of Pharmacy...While working as a pharmacist, Le participated in filling more than 745,000 prescriptions, including more than 100,000 for controlled substances,..READ MORE

Safety net providers are pushing back on the growing use of “2-tiered” policies among payers and pharmacy benefit managers under the 340B Drug Pricing Program that provide lower reimbursement rates for 340B-covered entities compared with non-340B entities...The practice has been challenged in court, finding its way to state legislatures through safety net providers who argue the practice is impacting their ability to serve more patients and offer comprehensive services…HHS has declined to intervene on the issue of 2-tier pricing under the 340B program, with both the Centers for Medicare and Medicaid Services and the Health Resources and Services Administration suggesting that they do not have authority to regulate this practice...READ MORE

A Chinese court jailed...the founder of a local traditional Chinese medicine firm for running a pyramid scheme, after the death of a young girl with cancer was linked to the company in an online article that sparked anger on social media...Shu Yuhui, founder and chairman of Quanjian Nature Medicine Technology Development, was sentenced to nine years in prison and fined 50 million yuan ($7.2 million), according to the court. The company was fined 100 million yuan..READ MORE

Purdue has been identified as "Pharma Co. X," an unnamed opioid maker at the center of a federal kickback probe that netted a $145 million criminal and civil settlement...from Practice Fusion, a subsidiary of Allscripts Healthcare...According to the U.S. Attorney's Office in Vermont, Practice Fusion admitted that it had solicited and received kickbacks from a major opioid company––allegedly Purdue, which shelled out roughly $1 million in payments––in exchange for using its electronic health record software to influence physician prescribing of opioid pain medications..."During the height of the opioid crisis, (Practice Fusion) took a million-dollar kickback to allow an opioid company to inject itself in the sacred doctor-patient relationship so that it could peddle even more of its highly addictive and dangerous opioids,” Christina Nolan, U.S. attorney for the District of Vermont, said in a statement...READ MORE

Chris Collins, a former Republican lawmaker and longtime ally of President Trump, was sentenced Friday to 26 months in prison, according to local reporters, months after pleading guilty to insider trading for illegal dealings surrounding an Australian biotech company...Collins, who leaked confidential information about a failed drug trial to his son and other associates, resigned his seat in Congress in October after entering a guilty plea. His sentencing caps a three-year saga that also implicated his family, at least four fellow congressmen, and Trump’s onetime health secretary. All have been dogged by allegations that they acted unethically, and in some cases illegally, when they purchased or sold shares of Innate Immunotherapeutics...READ MORE

Teva...agreed to pay $54 million to settle a years-old whistleblower lawsuit claiming it paid doctors—as speakers or consultants at “sham” events—to prescribe multiple sclerosis drug Copaxone and Parkinson’s med Azilect...Former Teva sales reps Charles Arnstein and Hossam Senousy sued the company in 2013, alleging the company set up a program to pay doctors to prescribe the drugs through speakers’ fees. The events weren't educational, though, and only served as a conduit for paying docs to prescribe the drugs, according to the whistleblowers...READ MORE