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Five pharmaceutical companies said...they have filed a complaint in a Canadian court challenging the constitutionality of new Canadian regulations meant to lower patented drug prices, setting up a fight with the federal government ahead of an Oct. 21 election...The complaint was filed in Quebec’s Superior Court by the Canadian arms of U.S.-based Merck & Co and Johnson & Johnson’s Janssen Inc, Germany’s Bayer AG and Boehringer Ingelheim, and France’s Servier Inc...The filing ratchets up a confrontation between the pharmaceutical industry and the Liberal government of Prime Minister Justin Trudeau, which has vowed to make affordability a key plank of its election campaign...The new rules will save patients, employers, insurers and government drug plans money, at the expense of drug company profits in Canada...READ MORE

The Nevada Independent filed a lawsuit...against the Nevada Department of Health and Human Services seeking access to a number of records related to the state’s 2017 diabetes drug pricing transparency law...The Independent filed two records requests this year seeking copies of annual reports submitted by diabetes drug companies and the drug pricing middlemen who help sell them to the state…The annual reports are required to explain how and why a drug price spikes over time...But the state has denied much of both requests on the grounds that such information is exempt from state public records law because of a federal trade secret law...READ MORE

Surescripts is upping its battle with Amazon-owned PillPack, accusing a third company of providing PillPack with patient prescription information “fraudulently,” and turning the matter over to the FBI. It’s the latest in a series of moves that could make it harder for Amazon to enter the prescription drug market...PillPack found a way to access its patients’ prescription information via a third-party called ReMy Health...Surescripts, which contracts with ReMy, said this represents “unauthorized access” to its network...READ MORE

An Oklahoma judge...approved Teva Pharmaceuticals’ revised $85 million settlement with the state over allegations the company helped fuel the nationwide opioid epidemic...decision came after state legislative leaders argued an earlier agreement did not comply with new state laws. Teva had reached an agreement with the state of Oklahoma last month, just two days before the drugmaker was set to face a trial alongside Johnson & Johnson...READ MORE

Endo International Plc and Allergan Plc have agreed to pay $15 million to avoid going to trial...in a landmark case by two Ohio counties accusing various drug manufacturers and distributors of fueling the U.S. opioid epidemic...The tentative deals...came ahead of the first trial to result from 2,000 lawsuits pending in federal court in Cleveland largely by local governments seeking to hold drug companies responsible for the deadly epidemic...The accords are the first to result from the counties’ cases, which were selected for the first bellwether, or test, trial in the litigation to allow parties to gauge the value of the remaining claims and inform potential settlement talks...READ MORE

Chamber of commerce and trade association health plans are in legal limbo after a federal judge ruled earlier this year that the Trump administration rule allowing them violates the Affordable Care Act...Some associations in Nevada have stopped allowing new businesses into their health plans out of an abundance of caution as the case goes up on appeal, while others have chosen to press forward. The heterogeneous response is the result of the fact that the court’s decision only affects some association health plans and the state Division of Insurance, which oversees the plans, doesn’t know which ones those are...READ MORE

The past business practices of biopharma companies like Endo and Teva continue to be under scrutiny. The scope of pending legal actions is difficult to quantify, given that both governments and individuals are involved, and the actions have now extended to price fixing as well as marketing...Using Iqvia prescription data, Purdue Pharma's $270 million settlement with Oklahoma and Teva's subsequent $85 million deal as benchmarks, Fadia calculated the total liability to be $4 billion for Endo, $2.5 billion for Teva, $1.2 billion for Amneal and $800 million for Mylan. That estimate relates to improper marketing of opioids...On the price-fixing charges, Fadia built an estimate around Iqvia prescriptions and potential excess sales that could have occurred on 114 different drugs, and then applied treble damages. In this scenario, Teva's liability could be as much as $3.1 billion, Mylan's $2.8 billion, Endo's $265 million and Amneal's $55 million…READ MORE

About five years ago, Nevada started taking high-profile steps toward tackling the opioid crisis. There were bills to curb doctor-shopping and over-prescribing in 2015 and 2017, a statewide opioid summit in 2016 and a cascade of lawsuits against opioid manufacturers from the state and local governments in the past few years...But has the growing awareness and response made a dent in the epidemic?...Scores of law enforcement, treatment professionals, elected officials and others gathered in Las Vegas this week for a two-day conference where they assessed progress and exchanged ideas on how to better tackle opioid abuse...Here are some takeaways from the event:...READ MORE

McKesson Corp., Cardinal Health Inc., and AmerisourceBergen Corp. have proposed paying $10 billion to settle claims they helped to fuel the U.S. opioid epidemic — the first sign of progress in resolving state lawsuits against the drug distributors…The companies, which deliver the majority of prescription medications to U.S. pharmacies, made the verbal proposal as part of talks with a group of state attorneys general...Whether the distributors and attorneys general can agree to a deal remains uncertain...READ MORE

...Reckitt Benckiser said it will pay up to $1.4 billion to settle all federal investigations related to the marketing of the opioid-dependence product Suboxone film by former subsidiary Indivior. The company denies all wrongdoing but said settling will avoid the "costs, uncertainty and distraction" of continued legal action... Reckitt's settlement is one of many now emerging from crackdowns on opioid marketing, with Purdue Pharma and Insys paying hundreds of millions to get out from under legal threats...The government claims Reckitt and Indivior deceptively marketed Suboxone Film as a safer, less divertable and less abusable form of opioid. Following the Reckitt settlement, these charges are still being made against Indivior, which was the target of a criminal grand jury indictment in the U.S. District Court for Western Virginia...READ MORE