Illinois could get up to $23 million from settlements with pharmaceutical companies that used deceptive practices to increase opioid prescriptions, helping fuel the nationwide opioid crisis.
The settlements, totaling $720 million, will go to nine states in a deal with eight pharmaceutical companies, with each company paying different amounts over varying periods, Attorney General Kwame Raoul announced.
“As long as Illinois families continue to experience the devastating impacts of opioid addiction, my office will continue to work with other attorneys general to hold companies responsible for fueling the opioid crisis,” Raoul said.
Illinois has so far collected about $1.4 billion of the roughly $50 billion in nationwide settlements from investigations and litigation with pharmaceutical companies, according to Raoul’s office.
The other states in line to receive payments are California, Colorado, New York, North Carolina, Oregon, Tennessee, Utah and Virginia.
These manufacturers will pay the following amounts to be split among the states:
- Mylan (now part of Viatris): $284,447,916 over nine years.
- Hikma: $95,818,293 over one to four years.
- Amneal: $71,751,010 over 10 years.
- Apotex: $63,682,369 in one year.
- Indivior: $38,022,450 over four years.
- Sun: $30,992,087 over one to four years.
- Alvogen: $18,680,162 in one year.
- Zydus: $14,859,220 in one year.
Under the agreement, seven of those companies are prohibited from promoting opioid products and from making or selling products that contain more than 40 milligrams of oxycodone per pill. They also must actively monitor and report suspicious orders.
Virginia-based Indivior will not manufacture or sell any opioid products over the next 10 years, according to the settlement, but is allowed to market and sell medications that treat opioid use disorder.
States also might receive free pharmaceutical products or might get cash instead of the products.
Between 1999 and 2022, roughly 725,000 people died from opioid overdose in the United States, according to the federal Centers for Disease Control and Prevention.