Missouri Opioid Experts Prioritize Expenditures in Anticipation of Big Pharma Settlement Money
Date Posted: December 6, 2019
Posted In: Discussion,
From St. Louis Post-Dispatch: Better access to medication-assisted treatment, housing and peer supports. Drug prevention classes starting as early as kindergarten.
These were among top funding priorities that experts named Monday to best use a settlement windfall that may come to Missouri from lawsuits against opioid painkiller companies that allegedly misrepresented the addictive nature of the prescription drugs.
The group spoke at a roundtable with Missouri Attorney General Eric Schmitt, who said he’s on a listening tour to better understand the opioid epidemic. He estimated that “tens of millions of dollars” could possibly come to Missouri within the next few years from ongoing cases.
Mallinckrodt Plc alone, the St. Louis-based drug manufacturer, faces more than 2,500 state and local government lawsuits, according to Bloomberg News. Purdue Pharma, the producer of OxyContin, also faces numerous lawsuits and has filed for bankruptcy protection.
While there will likely be many competing interests for the funds, Schmitt said he wanted to ensure any payout would “go to the right place and have the maximum impact.”
“We are working with the other states to make sure that Missouri’s interests are protected in bankruptcy court,” Schmitt said. “There are robust settlement discussions going on nationally and we are certainly a part of that.”