The Sackler family and their pharmaceutical company Purdue Pharma will pay $7.4 billion to address the "opioid crisis," which has killed hundreds of thousands of people and led to drug addiction in millions of Americans.
The amount was established in the settlement reached with several US states and will be used to support communities and individuals affected by opioids for assistance and treatment programs.
This is the largest of several settlements involving several pharmaceutical companies and pharmacy chains, for the production and distribution of these highly addictive drugs. In particular, Purdue's dominant role in creating the "opioid pandemic" was recognized.
The $7.4 billion settlement, representing a record compensation payable for the painkiller that has addicted one million Americans, was settled "in principle with members of the Sackler family and their company Purdue Pharma for their instrumental role in creating the opioid crisis," New York Attorney General Letitia James's office said in a statement.
But the last stage of this long legal process that has begun must now receive final approval from the Supreme Court: if it arrives, the Sacklers will pay up to 6.5 billion dollars over fifteen years. Even the remaining 900 million. As La Repubblica reports , according to the preliminary agreement, "the family will cede control of the company, whose board will be formed by states and entities that have filed suit, and will no longer be able to sell opioids in the US".
The accusation
Purdue and other opioid manufacturers and distributors were accused of encouraging the free prescription of their products, through unscrupulous marketing strategies and at the same time knowingly hiding the risks associated with taking these drugs. The opioid pharmaceutical giant had been denounced by local and state governments, Native American communities, citizens. The New York Attorney General had been joined, in a bipartisan manner, by Republican and Democratic-led states, from Oregon to Tennessee, from Texas to California.
OxyContin , the leading opioid manufactured and marketed by Purdue since the 1990s, is believed to be responsible for the overdose deaths of hundreds of thousands of people in the United States, and the Department of Justice estimates that more than a million people have abused it. It would have triggered a nationwide catastrophe: patients seeking pain relief turned into zombies and trapped in addiction.
The Sacklers, who are worth $11 billion, will have no legal shield from the civil lawsuits they unsuccessfully tried to escape by filing for bankruptcy in 2019.
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