Every state must sue Purdue Pharma, the Sackler family and other opioid producers.
Big Pharma drugging America. Big Pharma creating drug addicts. Big Pharma killing Americans.
Purdue Pharma, the maker of OxyContin, and its owners, the Sackler family, will pay nearly $275 million to settle a closely watched lawsuit brought by the state of Oklahoma, two months before the trial was set to begin, a person close to the situation said.
More than $100 million will go to fund a new addiction treatment and research center at Oklahoma State University in Tulsa. The Sacklers, who were not named in the lawsuit, will contribute an additional $75 million over five years to the center.
More than $70 million will go to pay Oklahoma cites, counties and tribes and to reimburse the state for its litigation costs. The package also includes $20 million in medicine for addiction treatment.
So far, the trial, which includes other pharmaceutical companies such as Johnson and Johnson is still on track to begin May 28. On Monday, the Oklahoma Supreme Court turned aside a bid by the defendants to delay the start by 100 days.
Purdue settled a lawsuit brought by
- West Virginia in 2004 for $10 million
- Kentucky in 2015 for $24 million.