Opioid drugmaker Purdue Pharma has pleaded guilty to criminal charges and reached an $8.3 billion settlement with the Department of Justice, a significant step in the process of resolving thousands of lawsuits related to the opioid epidemic. The Sackler family, founders of Purdue, will kick in $225 million—a small fraction of their immense wealth earned through their control of the company. The charges against Purdue include civil and criminal penalties related to violating federal requirements to monitor promotion and sales of a scheduled drug, involvement in a kickback scheme, and defrauding Medicare and Medicaid.
The entire Purdue settlement, however, won’t likely be paid because the company is in bankruptcy proceedings. And the drugmaker also faces thousands of other lawsuits by cities, states and Native American tribes for its alleged role in fueling the opioid crisis, which has killed more than 400,000 Americans over the past two decades. Counties and states are also negotiating a $26 billion opioid settlement with three major drug distributors, and there are additional cases pending against pharmacy chains.
The deal with Purdue reportedly doesn’t prevent the government from prosecuting owners or employees of the company in the future, which was a major sticking point in previous negotiations. Analysts say that settling with Purdue might clear the way for resolving the other lawsuits, and possibly reaching a larger global settlement with the scope and scale that adequately addresses the devastating consequences of the opioid epidemic.