Walgreens

History

2023: Fine of $230 million for the sale of narcotic drugs

On May 17, 2023, Walgreens Boots Alliance, one of the largest pharmacy chains in the United States, entered into a settlement agreement with the San Francisco authorities in a high-profile trial regarding the sale of narcotic drugs.

U.S. District Judge Charles Breyer accused Walgreens of failing to properly check prescriptions for opioid drugs for 15 years, Reuters reported. The case file says that between 2006 and 2020, Walgreens pharmacies received more than 1.2 million suspicious prescriptions for such drugs, but control was carried out in less than 5% of cases. Opioids include legal painkillers such as OxyContin and various forms of fentanyl.

The pharmacy chain will pay $230 million for the sale of narcotic drugs, due to which hundreds of thousands of Americans died

Walgreens' commercial practices are believed to have contributed to the development of the so-called opioid epidemic, which provoked a sharp increase in the number of deaths in the United States due to the uncontrolled use of opioid analgesics. According to the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention, from 1999 to 2021, more than 600,000 Americans died from drug overdoses, including over 107,000 in 2021 alone. San Francisco authorities estimate the cost of overcoming the opioid crisis at $8.1 billion.

Under the terms of the settlement, Walgreens will pay $230 million in compensation. The pharmacy chain itself does not admit guilt, but notes that the settlement of the conflict will avoid litigation and focus on meeting the needs of patients and society. At the same time, prosecutor David Chiu said that Walgreens' actions "made the opioid epidemic in San Francisco worse than it might otherwise have been" and that "there is no amount of money that could compensate for the lives lost."^[1]

2022: $13.8 billion payout for uncontrolled drug sales with Walmart and CVS Health

On November 2, 2022, it became known that one of the largest US pharmaceutical chains CVS Health and Walgreens, as well as giant Walmart, agreed to pay about $13.8 billion to settle thousands of lawsuits in connection with the opioid epidemic. Read more here.

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