Boots proprietor pays $500m settlement to New Mexico over claims it helped gasoline opioid habit within the state

The holding firm which owns Boots has agreed to pay $500m (£400m) to New Mexico to settle claims its pharmacies helped gasoline opioid habit, legal professionals for the state have stated.

The settlement, the biggest obtained by New Mexico towards a single firm over opioids, got here after a non-jury trial final 12 months within the state’s lawsuit towards the corporate.

The decide overseeing that trial had not but dominated on the state’s claims that Walgreen Boots Alliance fuelled opioid habit by failing to cease unlawful tablet gross sales.

Mark Pifko, a lawyer for the state, has stated in a press release: “We are confident that this record settlement positions New
Mexico to turn the tide on this deadly epidemic.”

New Mexico has now settled all of its main opioid-related lawsuits, recovering greater than $1bn (round £800m) together with Friday’s deal, Mr Pifko stated.

Walgreens Boots Alliance didn’t admit wrongdoing within the settlement.

The American-British-Swiss holding firm headquartered in Deerfield, Illinois, owns the retail pharmacy chains Walgreens within the US and Boots within the UK.

More than half one million folks died from drug overdoses within the United States from 1999 to 2020, with opioids accountable for a considerable amount of the deaths.

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Overdose deaths have risen additional since then, in keeping with knowledge from the US Centers for Disease Control and
Prevention.

New Mexico’s lawsuit towards Walgreens was one among greater than 3,300 filed by state and native governments accusing pharmacies and distributors of ignoring purple flags that opioids had been being diverted to the black market.

The lawsuits have additionally accused drugmakers of downplaying the dangers of the addictive ache medicine.

The litigation, now winding down, has resulted in additional than $50bn (round £40bn) in settlements, together with a $5.7bn (£4.5bn) nationwide deal between states and Walgreens by which New Mexico didn’t participate.