Florida Blames Walgreens & CVS For Opioid Deaths

Introduction

Florida is suing the nation's largest two drugstore chains, Walgreens and CVS, over their passive conduct to the increasing demand and supply of opioids into Florida.

On Friday, November 23, Attorney General Pam Bondi announced that the companies had been added to a state-court lawsuit filed in May against OxyContin maker Purdue Pharma and several other opioid distributors, including Percocet-maker Endo Pharmaceuticals and Teva Pharmaceutical. In a press release, she said, “CVS and Walgreens played a role in creating the opioid crisis. The companies failed to put a halt on suspicious orders of opioids and dispensed unreasonable quantities of opioids from their pharmacies.” According to the reports from the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention, annually 45 people fall prey to opioid overdose deaths every day in the U.S. In 2016, 42,249 people died due to opioid overdose.

According to the lawsuit filed, since 2006, Walgreens gave out billions of opioid dosages from its Florida store, 2.2 million opioid tablets from the Hudson store, and sold 2,85,000 pills in a month in an unidentified town. In some Walgreens stores, the opioid sales jumped six-fold in just two years. CVS was accused of selling 700 million opioid dosages between 2006 and 2014, including enormous sales in Hudson and nearby towns. The Rhode-island comprises more than 9,800 CVS stores.

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