WASHINGTON — McKinsey & The business consulting firm has agreed to pay $650 million to settle a federal investigation into its work for the opioid manufacturer Purdue Pharmaaccording to court documents filed Friday in Virginia.
As part of the deal with the US Department of Justice, McKinsey will avoid criminal charges if it pays the sum and adheres to certain conditions for five years, including ceasing all sales, marketing or promotion activities controlled substances, the court said. paper.
A former McKinsey senior partner has also agreed to plead guilty to obstruction of justice for deleting documents from his laptop after learning about investigations into Purdue Pharma, the documents show.
McKinsey representatives did not immediately respond to phone and email messages Friday.
Lawsuits show that Purdue paid McKinsey more than $93 million over 15 years for a number of products, including how to improve revenue from OxyContin.
One of the tasks, the papers said, was to identify which prescribers would generate the most additional prescriptions if Purdue salespeople focused on them. That resulted in prescriptions that were “not for a medically accepted indication, unsafe, ineffective and medically unnecessary, and were often diverted for use without a legitimate medical purpose,” the filing said.
The company also tried to help Purdue get a say in shaping federal rules intended to ensure that the benefits of addictive prescription drugs outweighed the risks. The government said in its new documents that this resulted in high-dose OxyContin being subject to the same oversight as lower-dose opioids, and training for prescribers was made voluntary rather than mandatory.
As of 2021, McKinsey has agreed state to pay and local governments about $765 million in settlements for her role in advising companies on how to sell more powerful prescription painkillers amid a national opioid crisis.
The consultancy also agreed to pay last year healthcare funds and insurance companies $78 million.
The US has been grappling with an addiction and overdose crisis for decades, leading to more than 80,000 deaths in recent years. Over the past decade, most deaths have been attributed to illicit fentanyl, which is found in many illegal drugs. Earlier in the epidemic, prescription pills were the leading cause of death.
Some advocates say the crisis began when Purdue Pharma’s OxyContin hit the market in 1996.
Three Purdue executives pleaded guilty in 2007 to misbranding charges and the company agreed to pay a fine. The company pleaded guilty to criminal charges in 2020 and agreed to $8.3 billion in fines and forfeitures — most of which will be forgiven as long as it settles through bankruptcy court. still in the making.
McKinsey documents that have become public over the years detail that Purdue used the consulting firm in 2013 to boost opioid sales as the backlash against the opioid crisis reduced the prescription of the company’s drugs.
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Mulvihill reported from Philadelphia.