Opioid epidemic accountability trial begins; states try to block Purdue Pharma owners from legal immunity

The opioid epidemic has hit Appalachia particularly hard, so it's perhaps fitting that the first federal trial against drug companies in the epidemic began Monday in West Virginia. "Cabell County and its seat, Huntington, will test a legal claim made by thousands of cities, counties, Native American tribes and other plaintiffs that drug companies ignored red flags and flooded their communities with addictive pain pills, causing a 'public nuisance' and fueling an epidemic of substance abuse, overdoses and deaths," Meryl Kornfield reports for The Washington Post. "The landmark trial in West Virginia against drug distributors known as the 'Big Three' — AmerisourceBergen, Cardinal Health and McKesson — comes after an 11th-hour settlement averted an Ohio trial in October 2019 and coronavirus-related delays stalled opioid cases across the country."

In the trial, described as the most complex civil case in the nation, "Thousands of local governments and jurisdictions are arguing that the companies had a responsibility to ensure that the billions of pain pills pumped into their communities were not diverted for illegal use," Kornfield reports. "The distributors say they complied with the law, delivering drugs approved by the government to pharmacies." The verdict could lay the groundwork for settlements in other such cases.

There's only been one other opioid epidemic trial: in 2019 in a Cleveland courtroom, Johnson & Johnson was ordered to pay $465 million after the other defendants, Teva Pharmaceuticals and OxyContin-maker Purdue Pharma settled, Kornfield reports.

Speaking of Purdue, attorneys general from 24 states and Washington, D.C., are trying to block the Sackler family, which owns Purdue Pharma, from gaining legal immunity from future opioid lawsuits. "In exchange for what amounts to a legal firewall for the Sacklers and their remaining empire, members of the family have offered to forfeit control of their bankrupt drug company and pay $4.2 billion from their private fortunes," Brian Mann reports for NPR.

Though such a settlement could prevent years of expensive litigation and get struggling communities financial aid more quickly, "a growing group of public officials and activists is mounting a last-ditch effort to derail the plan, describing it in legal briefs as an unethical, and possibly unlawful, use of the bankruptcy court's power," Mann reports.