It’s another day of opioid-litigation headlines for Teva.
This time, the company reached a $54 million settlement with the city of San Francisco, agreeing to pay $43 million in cash payments and provide $20 million worth of Narcan, the overdose reversal drug.
Just yesterday, New York Attorney General Letitia James accused Teva of lying and downplaying its involvement in the opioid crisis. Now, through the litigation in San Francisco, City Attorney David Chiu has secured thus far over $120 million in cash payments and other benefits to “bring relief to our communities.”
The closing arguments for the case were live-streamed yesterday, closing just this chapter of the settlement that began in 2018. In the initial lawsuit, the city of San Francisco also accused Walgreens of over-dispensing opioids without properly identifying suspicious orders as they were required to do by law.
The State of California alleged that between 2006 and 2014, San Francisco County saw 163,645,704 opioids distributed, or 22 pills per person per year, which resulted in a 478 percent increase in opioid-related overdose deaths over the next five years. The city had previously settled with opioid manufacturer Johnson & Johnson and distributors McKesson, Cardinal, and AmerisourceBergen in similar litigation for $60 million.