Purdue Pharma and owners to pay $7.4 billion in settlement to lawsuits over the toll of OxyContin
The Sackler family agreed to give up ownership of the company that manufactures the powerful opioid. A previous deal was rejected by the Supreme Court.
Members of the family who own OxyContin maker Purdue Pharma, and the company itself, agreed to pay up to $7.4 billion in a new settlement to lawsuits over the toll of the powerful prescription painkiller, the attorneys general from several states announced Thursday.
The deal, agreed to by Purdue Pharma, the Sackler family members who own the company, and lawyers representing state and local governments and thousands of victims of the opioid crisis, replaces a previous settlement deal that was rejected last year by the U.S. Supreme Court.
In the new one, the Sacklers agreed to pay up to $6.5 billion and give up ownership of the company, which would pay nearly $900 million. The maximum contribution from family members is $500 million more than the previous deal.
It’s among the largest settlements reached over the past several years in a series of lawsuits by local, state, Native American tribal governments, and others seeking to hold companies responsible for a deadly epidemic. Aside from the Purdue deal, others worth around $50 billion have been announced — and most of the money is required to be used to stem the crisis.
The deal still needs court approval, and some of the details are yet to be ironed out. An arm of the federal Department of Justice opposed the previous settlement, even after every state agreed, and took the battle to the U.S. Supreme Court. But under President Donald Trump, the federal government is not expected to oppose the new deal.
“We are extremely pleased that a new agreement has been reached that will deliver billions of dollars to compensate victims, abate the opioid crisis, and deliver treatment and overdose rescue medicines that will save lives,” Stamford, Connecticut-based Purdue said in a statement.
“While no amount of money will ever fully repair the damage they caused, this massive influx of funds will bring resources to communities in need so that we can heal,” New York Attorney General Letitia James said.
Joining James in reaching the deal were the attorneys general of California, Colorado, Connecticut, Delaware, Florida, Illinois, Massachusetts, Oregon, Pennsylvania, Tennessee, Texas, Vermont, Virginia, and West Virginia.
A portion of the money is also to go to victims of the opioid crisis or their survivors — something that most opioid settlements do not include. The deal also includes as much as $800 million set aside to pay for future settlements if new lawsuits arise against the Sacklers, according to the New York attorney general’s office.
The Supreme Court blocked the earlier agreement last year because it protected members of the wealthy family from civil lawsuits over OxyContin — even though the family members themselves were not in bankruptcy. The new agreement protects family members from lawsuits only from entities that agree to the settlement.