Pharmacy giant Walgreens accused of ‘flooding’ Florida with opioids

Walgreens, one of the largest pharmacy chains in America, is being accursed of ‘flooding’ the state of Florida with opioids in a civil suit.

The company is being sued by the state of Florida for allegedly failing to do its due diligence in filling opioid prescriptions from 1999 to 2020, and not diverting drugs away from patients that were likely to either abuse of illegally use the drugs.

One lawyer for the Sunshine state even said the Deerfield, Illinois-based company, had allowed the highly addictive drugs to flood into the state.

The suit comes as many high profile players in the opioid crisis – which is responsible for tens of thousands of U.S. deaths every year, face a reckoning of civil suits.

Walgreens points to physicians for the problem, blaming them for over-prescribing the highly addictive drugs to vulnerable patients

‘Walgreens was the last line of defense in preventing improper distribution of opioids,’ Jim Webster, who is serving as the state’s lawyer, said. 

‘It was the entity that actually put the opioids in the hands of people addicted to opioids and the hands of criminals.’ 

Steven Derringer (pictured(, Walgreens attorney, said ‘There are so many pills because doctors have written so many prescriptions for pain medicine.’

Walgreens filled one in four opioid prescriptions in Florida between 1999 and 2020, and failed to investigate red flags that could have prevented drugs from being diverted for illegal use, Webster said as jurors heard opening statements in the trial held in New Port Richey, just north of Tampa.

Many of the drugs illicitly sold on black markets are legally obtained via prescriptions, and many people who end up abusing highly-addictive opioids do get started by using the drugs as a pain-killer. 

The company argues that the fault falls on doctors for writing so many prescriptions for the drugs. 

Steven Derringer, Walgreens attorney, said in his opening statement that the pharmacy chain filled prescriptions from doctors and did not ignore red flags that allowed opioids to flood Florida.

‘There are so many pills because doctors have written so many prescriptions for pain medicine,’ Derringer said.

Physicians have come under scrutiny in recent years for the role they potentially played in creating the opioid epidemic.

Multiple analysis’s find that doctors over-prescribed the drugs, often giving them to patients who either did not require them, or offered more than what was needed.

This especially became a problem after surgeries, where many patients who needed the drugs for pain management purposes ended up taking so much that they became dependent. 

Walgreens is the final defendant in a massive wave of lawsuits filed by the state against drug distributors and manufacturers for the role they allegedly played in surging drug deaths in Florida, and around America.

Florida has collected more than $3 billion in opioid litigation against drugmakers, distributors and pharmacies, according to Attorney General Ashley Moody. 

CVS was also sued by the state of Florida, and paid a half-billion dollar settlement for its role in the opioid crisis

Most will be spent on efforts to mitigate the opioid crisis in the state. 

‘With the monies that we’re going to bring to Florida. These families are going to start healing,’ Moody told Fox 13 in Tampa. 

In March, Walgreens rival CVS Health Corp agreed to pay Florida $484 million.

Drugmakers Teva will pay $194.8 million, Allergan will pay $134.2 million and Endo will pay $65 million.

Moody says it is about more than just the money, though, its about stopping these harmful business practices.

‘The marketing the distributing, the practices that led to where we are today, cannot happen again in the future,’ she said.

Walgreens previously argued it was immune from being sued based on a mere $3,000 settlement it reached with Florida in 2012, following an investigation into its record-keeping policies and efforts to prevent the diversion of opioid drugs.

Judge Kimberly Sharpe Byrd, who is overseeing this trial, ruled in March that the 2012 settlement addressed only a single record-keeping violation and did not protect Walgreens from other claims. 

The company has appealed her ruling.

The U.S. recorded a record 105,000 drug overdose deaths from October 2020 to 2021, with 80 percent being caused by opioids, and synthetic versions of the drug like fentanyl making up 70 percent of deaths, the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention reports (CDC).

Many people who develop an opioid addiction will eventually transition to using illicit versions of the drug once their original supply runs out.

Some of these illicit drug manufacturers use fentanyl as a cheaper alternative to opioid drugs made by pharmaceutical companies.

The drug is highly potent, though, and just limited amounts of it can cause an overdose.

Florida recorded the 8,000 overdose deaths from October 2020 to 2021, per the CDC report, or 37.1 per every 100,000 residents – the 18th highest rate in the state.