Miami Sues Opioid Manufacturers and Distributors Over Epidemic

MIAMI, FL — The city of Miami has filed a lawsuit against opioid manufacturers and distributors, claiming that they created a public nuisance in Florida's second largest city and then profited from it. The lawsuit, which was filed in Circuit Court on Monday, seeks compensatory damages and restitution of "illgotten gains." Officials noted that Miami Fire Rescue responded to 1,716 calls involving opioid antidote Naloxone in 2016, an increase of more than 1,000 calls from the previous year when the agency logged only 668 such calls.

“We believe the pharmaceutical industry knowingly inflicted a great burden on the people of the city of Miami and our nation," asserted City Manager Emilio T. Gonzalez. "This industry has been allowed to get away with this injustice for far too long. It is time that they are held accountable and remedy the devastating circumstances that they created.”

The lawsuit alleges that 91 people die from an opioid-related overdose in the United States every day and that more than 1,000 patients are given emergency treatment for misusing opioids.

"Many others are swept into a cycle of addiction and abuse with which they will struggle their entire lives," the document alleged. "As many as one in four patients who receive prescription opioids long-term for chronic pain in primary care settings and over 1,000 patients are given emergency treatment for misusing them."

The lawsuit charged that while opioids have been abused through "illicit prescribing and sales," it is legitimate prescriptions that have created and fueled the crisis.

City officials insist that manufacturing companies "created and sustained a multi-billion dollar pain franchise" through a pattern of deceptive marketing.

Earlier this year, city officials retained an "all-star team" made up of 18 law firms to tackle the city’s opioid epidemic. Miami is one of the first Florida cities and the largest city thus far in the state to pursue litigation against opioid companies.

The lawsuit claims that the manufacturing companies helped "cultivate a narrative that pain was under treated and pain treatment should be a higher priority for health care providers," paving the way for increased prescriptions of opioids for chronic pain.

"Once the manufacturing defendants created mass market for prescription opioids, distributor defendants flooded it," the lawsuit charged. "Distributor defendants are responsible for delivering opioids marketed and made by the manufacturing defendants to pharmacies throughout the country."

Officials maintain that the distributors have a duty under Florida law to report and to not ship suspicious orders of controlled substances, including orders of opioids that exceed reasonable volume or frequency, into Miami.

"Yet, distributor defendants have supplied opioids in quantities that they knew or should have known exceed any legitimate market for opioids — even the wider market for chronic pain and ignored red flags of suspicious orders of these drugs in the city."

John Parker, senior vice president of the Healthcare Distribution Alliance, which represents three of the distributors named in the suit, told Patch that the opioid crisis calls for a "collaborative and systemic response" that includes all of the various stakeholders.

"Given our role, the idea that distributors are responsible for the number of opioid prescriptions written defies common sense and lacks understanding of how the pharmaceutical supply chain actually works and is regulated," said Parker. "Those bringing lawsuits would be better served addressing the root causes, rather than trying to redirect blame through litigation.”

The U.S. Justice Department said in February that it would support local officials in hundreds of lawsuits against manufacturers and distributors. The move is part of a broader effort to more aggressively target prescription-drug makers for their role in the opioid epidemic, according to Attorney General Jeff Sessions.

The Justice Department maintains that the federal government has borne substantial costs as a result of the crisis that claimed more than 64,000 lives in 2016.

Manufacturers named in the Miami suit include Purdue Pharma, L.P., Purdue Pharma Inc., the Purdue Frederick Company, Teva Pharmaceuticals USA, Inc., Cephalon, Inc., Janssen Pharmaceuticals, Inc., Ortho-McNeil-Janssen Pharmaceuticals, Inc., Janssen Pharmaceutica Inc., Endo Health Solutions Inc. and Endo Pharmaceuticals Inc.

The companies manufacture brand-name drugs that include OxyContin, Butrans, Hysingla ER, Actiq, Fentora, Opana/Opana ER, Percodan, Percocet, Zydone, Nucynta/Nucynta ER, Duragesic, generic oxycodone and Subsys.

Distributors named in the suit include McKesson Corporation doing business as McKesson Drug Company, Amerisource Bergen Drug Corporation, Walgreens Boots Alliance doing business as Walgreens Co. and Cardinal Health, Inc.

The Associated Press contributed to this report.

U.S. Attorney General Jeff Sessions (C) joins with U.S. Navy Adm. Kurt Tidd, SOUTHCOM's commander (L) and Anthony Williams, Drug Enforcement Administration associate administrator, during the opening remarks at the U.S. Southern Command Opioid Summit on Feb. 8, 2018 in Doral, Florida. (Photo by Joe Raedle/Getty Images).