DEERFIELD, IL — The U.S. Department of Justice accuses Walgreens of filling millions of prescriptions over the past decade without a legitimate purpose that contained dangerous amounts of opioids, according to a lawsuit filed this week.
The complaint filed in the U.S. District Court for the Northern District of Illinois says pharmacists at the drugstore chain filled prescriptions for controlled substances with clear red flags indicating they were likely illegal. Walgreens also systematically pressured pharmacists to fill prescriptions without taking the time to verify their validity, according to the complaint.
According to the complaint, Walgreens wrote “illegal” prescriptions in violation of the federal Controlled Substances Act and sought reimbursement for the prescriptions from federal health care programs in violation of the False Claims Act.
Walgreens, one of the nation’s largest pharmacy chains with more than 8,000 stores, said in a statement that it stands with pharmacists. It said that for drugs approved by the Food and Drug Administration, legitimate prescriptions must be filled by a Drug Enforcement Administration-licensed prescriber in accordance with all applicable laws and regulations.
According to the complaint, Walgreens is also accused of ignoring evidence from its own pharmacists and internal data that its stores were dispensing illegal prescriptions. It also allegedly deprived pharmacists of important information, including by preventing them from warning each other about specific prescribers.
“This lawsuit seeks to hold Walgreens accountable for years of failure to meet its obligations in dispensing dangerous opioids and other drugs,” Brian M. Boynton, principal deputy assistant attorney general in the Justice Department’s civil division, said in a statement. It is a question of . “These practices enabled millions of opioid pills and other controlled substances to illegally leave Walgreens stores.”
The company asked the court to clarify the responsibilities of pharmacies and pharmacists and protect them from government attempts to enforce arbitrary “rules” that do not appear in any law or regulation and have not gone through a formal rule-making process. He said he is asking them to do so.
“We will not sit back and allow the government to put pharmacists in a no-win situation by trying to follow ‘rules’ that don’t exist,” Walgreens said in a statement.
The company also said it is a leader in implementing best policies and procedures as well as providing education and resources to combat opioid misuse.
The Department of Justice filed a similar lawsuit against CVS in December. A spokesperson for the chain said it strongly opposes the “misrepresentation” of the allegations and charges.
Federal prosecutors have been trying to hold companies accountable for their alleged roles in America’s addiction and overdose crisis, where opioids have been linked to more than 80,000 deaths a year in recent years.
Over the past decade, most of these deaths have been attributed to illegal fentanyl, which is mixed into many illegal drugs. Prescription drugs used to be the main cause.
Over the past eight years, drug companies, wholesalers and pharmacies have agreed to approximately $50 billion in settlements with governments, most of which will go toward fighting the crisis.
