Walgreens fueled San Francisco’s opioid crisis with thousands of ‘suspicious orders,’ judge rules

Walgreens helped gas the opioid epidemic in San Francisco by transport hundreds of “suspicious orders” of prescribed drugs to its pharmacies, a federal choose dominated Wednesday.

Greater than 100 million prescription opioid capsules had been distributed by Walgreens within the metropolis between 2006 and 2020, and through that point, the pharmacy large failed to research hundreds of orders deemed suspicious, U.S. District Choose Charles Breyer wrote in his 112-page opinion in a lawsuit filed by San Francisco towards main prescription-drug sellers.

“Walgreens has regulatory obligations to take cheap steps to forestall the medication from being diverted and harming the general public,” Breyer wrote. “The proof at trial established that Walgreens breached these obligations.”

The lawsuit, filed by San Francisco in 2018, additionally included claims towards Johnson & Johnson, Allergan, Purdue Pharma, Teva Pharmaceutical Industries and Endo Worldwide, in addition to McKesson Corp., AmerisourceBergen Corp. and Cardinal Well being — the three largest drug distributors within the nation.

Walgreens was the one firm that didn’t attain a settlement with town earlier than the courtroom ruling. Johnson & Johnson and the three drug distributors had been a part of a $26-billion nationwide settlement earlier this 12 months.

The corporate expressed its disappointment with the courtroom ruling and mentioned it’s planning to attraction, Reuters reported. Walgreens didn’t instantly reply to The Occasions’ request for remark.

“We by no means manufactured or marketed opioids, nor did we distribute them to the ‘capsule mills’ and web pharmacies that fueled this disaster,” Walgreens spokesman Fraser Engerman instructed Reuters.