Additionally, Herrera alleged that the pharmaceutical companies violated several federal statutes including the Racketeer Influenced and Corrupt Organizations Act. He noted that the defendants engaged in widespread fraud involving conspiracy, mail and wire fraud to deceptively market opioids.
The pharmaceutical companies allegedly deceive doctors and patients by marketing opioids as being:
- rarely, if ever, addictive;
- safe and effective for the treatment of chronic long-term pain and everyday use;
- abuse resistant or deterrent; and/or
- safe and effective for other types of pain for which the drugs were not approved.
Millions of people are now suffering from opioid addiction
Furthermore, he alleged that the pharmaceutical companies failed suspicious orders as required by law, thus, flooding the market with opioids.
Herrera noted that last year alone, more than 318,000 prescriptions were written for opioids in San Francisco.
Their deception and negligence resulted to millions of people suffering from opioid addiction and led to thousands of overdose deaths nationwide. Between 1999 and 2016, over 200,000 people in the U.S. died from overdoses related to prescription opioids, according to Herrera.
