Minnesota to Share in $4.3 Billion Settlement with Opioid Maker Purdue Pharma

(KNSI) – Minnesota is part of a multi-billion dollar settlement deal reached with Purdue Pharma concerning their alleged role in the opioid crisis.

As part of the agreement, OxyContin maker Purdue Pharma will cease to exist, and the Sackler family, the owners, will be banned from the opioid business. According to a press release, the deal “significantly improves upon an earlier settlement offer made by Purdue and the Sacklers before filing bankruptcy in the fall of 2019. Under the terms of that settlement, the Sackler family would have paid $3 billion for prevention, treatment, and recovery and would not have been required to disclose any company documents.”

Terms of the agreement reached late Wednesday night make public tens of millions of documents about the original FDA approval of OxyContin and tactics to promote opioids.

Over nine years, the Sacklers will have to personally pay $4.325 billion for prevention measures, treatment programs, and recovery efforts in Minnesota, and 24 other states, along with Washington D.C. That amount is one of the largest sums in U.S. history ever paid to resolve law enforcement action. Minnesota’s chunk is expected to total around $5 million per year for the next nine years. Spending will be overseen by the Opioid Epidemic Response Advisory Council.

According to the Minnesota Department of Health Drug Overdose Dashboard, 4,821 Minnesotans died of opioid overdoses from 2000-19. Preliminary reports show 654 opioid-involved deaths in Minnesota in 2020, a 59% increase from 2019.

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