Williamson County files lawsuit against opioid manufacturers, distributors

Williamson County filed a federal lawsuit against several drug manufacturers and distributors on Wednesday, alleging the companies failed to comply with the federal Controlled Substances Act.

The lawsuit, filed in Tennessee's Middle District, names five of the nation's largest prescription opioid manufacturers and their subsidiaries, as well as three major wholesale drug distributors, as defendants. 

The 158-page complaint seeks to hold the defendants accountable for allegedly failing to follow federal requirements to "monitor, identify and report suspicious activity in the size and frequency of opioid shipments to pharmacies and hospitals," according to a press release issued late Wednesday afternoon. 

"The manufacturers aggressively pushed highly addictive, dangerous opioids, falsely representing to doctors that patients would only rarely succumb to drug addiction," the lawsuit alleges. "These pharmaceutical companies aggressively advertised to and persuaded doctors to prescribe highly addictive, dangerous opioids, turned patients into drug addicts for their own corporate profit." 

The suit also accuses drug distributors, including industry giants known as the "Big 3" – McKesson Corporation, Cardinal Health and AmerisourceBergen – of breaching their legal obligations under federal and state law "to monitor, detect, investigate, refuse and report suspicious orders of prescription opiates." 

The county is seeking damages that include compensation for "past and future costs to abate the ongoing public nuisance caused by the opioid epidemic," as well as the creation of an abatement fund to help further curb opioid-related expenses.

The filing comes just weeks after Williamson County Commissioners voted to authorize the litigation at a special meeting on Dec. 11, 2017.

After this story was first published Wednesday afternoon, a spokesperson from the Healthcare Distribution Alliance (HDA), a trade organization representing drug distributors including Cardinal Health, McKesson and AmerisourceBergen, reached out to The Tennessean with a statement. 

“As distributors, we understand the tragic impact the opioid epidemic has on communities across the country. We are deeply engaged in the issue and are taking our own steps to be part of the solution – but we aren’t willing to be scapegoats," said John Parker, senior vice president of communications for HDA. "We don’t make medicines, market medicines, prescribe medicines, or dispense them to consumers."

“Given our role, the idea that distributors are solely responsible for the number of opioid prescriptions written defies common sense and lacks understanding of how the pharmaceutical supply chain actually works and how it is regulated," Parker said. 

More than 1,630 Tennesseans died from drug overdoses in 2016, according to the Tennessee Department of Health – the highest annual number of deaths recorded in state history, and a 12-percent increase from the previous year. 

"Based on the latest data from the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention, nearly 6 opioid prescriptions were dispensed for every 10 residents of Williamson County in 2016," the press release says. 

The county has hired several law firms to help with the case. Those firms include: Levin, Papantonio, Thomas, Mitchell, Rafferty & Proctor; Greene Ketchum Bailey Farrell & Tweel; Baron & Budd; Hill, Peterson, Carper, Bee & Deitzler; and McHugh Fuller Law Group.

Reach Elaina Sauber at esauber@tennessean.com, 615-571-1172 or follow @ElainaSauber on Twitter.