Florida is suing the nation’s two largest drugstore chains, Walgreens and CVS, alleging they added to the state and national opioid crisis by overselling painkillers and not taking precautions to stop illegal sales and more in today’s Markets In Brief.
Attorney General Pam Bondi announced late Friday that she has added the companies to a state-court lawsuit filed last spring against Purdue Pharma, the maker of OxyContin, and several opioid distributors.
Bondi said in a press release that CVS and Walgreens “played a role in creating the opioid crisis.” She said the companies failed to stop “suspicious orders of opioids” and “dispensed unreasonable quantities of opioids from their pharmacies.” On average, about 45 people die nationally each day because of opioid overdoses, according to the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention.
“We will continue to pursue those companies that played a role in creating the opioid crisis,” said Bondi, who has been mentioned as a possible replacement by President Donald Trump for recently ousted U.S. Attorney General Jeff Sessions. “Thousands of Floridians have suffered as a result of the actions of the defendants.”
CVS did not immediately respond Saturday to emails seeking comment. Walgreens did not immediately respond to a phone message and emails. Both companies on their websites say they are committed to fighting opioid abuse.
Until a law enforcement crackdown at the beginning of the decade, Florida was known for its so-called pain mills. Drug dealers from throughout the country would send associates to store-front clinics where unscrupulous doctors would write opioid prescriptions for bogus injuries and illnesses. At one point, 90 of the nation’s top 100 opioid prescribers were Florida doctors, according to federal officials.
After receiving the prescriptions, the phony patients would buy the pills from Florida pharmacies — state law says pharmacists must refuse to fill prescriptions they suspect are not for a valid purpose. Most of the opioids would then be taken out of state to be resold illegally at huge markups, creating a drug crisis in many communities throughout the Eastern United States.
According to the lawsuit, Walgreens has dispensed billions of opioid dosages from its Florida pharmacies since 2006. The Illinois-based chain is the nation’s largest drugstore chain and has more than 13,200 stores globally.
The company distributed 2.2 million opioid tablets from its store in Hudson, a Tampa-area town of 12,000, and in one unidentified town of 3,000, sold 285,000 pills in a month, the lawsuit says. In some stores, its opioid sales jumped six-fold in two years. The company paid $80 million five years ago to resolve a federal investigation that centered on inadequate record keeping of its Florida opioid sales that allowed the pills to reach the black market.
Florida’s accusations against CVS were more general, saying it sold 700 million opioid dosages between 2006 and 2014, including outsized sales in Hudson and two other nearby towns. The Rhode Island-based chain has more than 9,800 stores.
MARKETS IN BRIEF
Average US Price of Gas Drops 12 Cents Per Gallon to $2.72
The average U.S. price of regular-grade gasoline has dropped 12 cents a gallon over the past two weeks, to $2.72.
Industry analyst Trilby Lundberg of the Lundberg Survey said Sunday that falling crude oil costs are the main reason for the decrease at the pump.
The average gas price is 11 cents per gallon higher than it was a year ago, and 13 cents lower than earlier this month.
The highest average price in the nation is $3.77 a gallon in Honolulu. The lowest average is $2.19 in Tulsa, Oklahoma.
The average price of diesel fell 4 cents over the past two weeks, to $3.27.
Cuomo Says Amazon HQ Will Cost New Yorkers ‘Nada’
New York Gov. Andrew Cuomo says a deal to bring Amazon’s second headquarters to Queens will cost taxpayers “nothing” — even though they’re on the hook for $325 million in direct grants to the company.
Under the deal announced last week, the state will also give Seattle-based Amazon $1.2 billion in tax breaks over 10 years.
The Democratic governor argues the state will come out far ahead when billions of dollars in new tax revenues from the company is factored in.
Critics of the deal say the state is giving away too much to lure one of the world’s biggest companies.
Cuomo defended the deal Monday, saying on New York City public radio the state beat out dozens of other contenders who were offering bigger subsidies.
Nissan Chairman Ghosn Fired for Misconduct
Nissan Motor Co.’s high-flying chairman Carlos Ghosn is to be dismissed after the company said an internal investigation found he under-reported his income by millions of dollars and engaged in other “significant misconduct.”
The Japanese broadcaster NHK said Ghosn was arrested Monday after he voluntarily submitted to questioning by Tokyo prosecutors. The prosecutors’ office did not confirm that.
The Yokohama-based company, one of the world’s largest automakers, said the violations were discovered during an investigation over several months that was instigated by a whistleblower. Ghosn, 64, also allegedly engaged in personal use of company assets, it said.
Nissan said it was providing information to the prosecutors and cooperating with their investigation. The allegations also concern a Nissan representative director, Greg Kelly, it said.
Together, the two under-reported their income by a combined 5 billion yen ($44 million) from 2011-2015, Japan’s Kyodo News service reported.
Nissan’s CEO Hiroto Saikawa planned to propose to its board that Ghosn and Kelly both be removed from their posts, the company said in a statement.
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