Are drug stores now responsible for doing their own screening on products?
I wonder what will happen to dispensaries once companies like Rite Aid are allowed to crumble.
"“We allege that Rite Aid filled hundreds of thousands of prescriptions that did not meet legal requirements,” said Associate Attorney General Vanita Gupta. “According to our complaint, Rite Aid’s pharmacists repeatedly filled prescriptions for controlled substances with obvious red flags, and Rite Aid intentionally deleted internal notes about suspicious prescribers. These practices opened the floodgates for millions of opioid pills and other controlled substances to flow illegally out of Rite Aid’s stores.”
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The government’s complaint alleges that, from May 2014 through June 2019, Rite Aid knowingly filled at least hundreds of thousands of unlawful prescriptions for controlled substances that lacked a legitimate medical purpose, were not for a medically accepted indication, or were not issued in the usual course of professional practice. These unlawful prescriptions included, for example, prescriptions for the dangerous and highly abused combination of drugs known as “the trinity,” prescriptions for excessive quantities of opioids, such as oxycodone and fentanyl, and prescriptions issued by prescribers whom Rite Aid pharmacists had repeatedly identified internally as writing illegitimate prescriptions.
The government alleges that Rite Aid pharmacists filled these prescriptions despite clear “red flags” that were highly indicative that the prescriptions were unlawful. The government further alleges that Rite Aid not only ignored substantial evidence from multiple sources that its stores were dispensing unlawful prescriptions, including from certain pharmacists, its distributor, and its own internal data, but compounded its failure to act by intentionally deleting internal notes about suspicious prescribers written by Rite Aid pharmacists and directing district managers to tell pharmacists “to be mindful of everything that is put in writing.” By knowingly filling unlawful prescriptions for controlled substances, the government alleges that Rite Aid violated the CSA and, where Rite Aid sought reimbursement from federal healthcare programs, also violated the FCA."
Source: https://www.justice.gov/usao-ndoh/pr/united-states-files-com...
> A federal judge in Ohio who oversees the National Prescription Opiate Litigation (NPOL) has recently issued a ruling with significant implications for pharmacists and pharmacies. The ruling requires pharmacists to document refusals of opioid prescriptions based on so-called “red flags.” Pharmacy companies are required to share these documented refusals with pharmacists at all of their practice sites. Pharmacists are required to consider their colleagues’ documented prior refusals during their screen of subsequent opioid prescriptions.
I'm not sure if (or why) they aren't going after the doctors making the red flag prescriptions, however.
As someone who was an (alternate) juror on a Federal "pill mill" trial, they are. That trial was truly eye opening to how flagrant some doctors are when it comes to writing bogus prescriptions.
The doctor in that trial had deals with imaging companies to create justification for egregious prescriptions. I'm talking about starting people on 160 mg/day of oxy for relatively minor "injuries." Several pharmacies reported the doctor which helped get the investigation rolling.
Was odd to me that they didn't explain what it is: opioids, benzodiazepines and carisoprodol (muscle relaxant).
It seems so obvious that this is the kind of thing the government is eventually going to go after.
I can only wonder if this was a policy made my management (CEO/CFO) that was hidden from the board? To boost performance for bonuses/stock/etc. and then leave the owners to clean up the mess when it was finally discovered?
Is the situation similar with CVS or Walgreens ? If not, why not ?
Did they have better controls, or they just got lucky from a number of factors (i.e. lower presence in states with serious opioid problems, etc)
https://www.npr.org/2022/11/02/1133523740/cvs-health-agrees-...
https://www.pbs.org/newshour/economy/judge-says-pharmacies-o...
The DoJ said they violated two acts in doing so: https://www.justice.gov/usao-ndoh/pr/united-states-files-com...
Why did they do it? Because like everyone else involved: there were big profits to be made.
Rite-Aid is the first pharmacy to file for bankrupcy but several drugmakers have already done so.
https://www.npr.org/2023/10/16/1206256476/rite-aid-files-for...
> The latest data from the centers for Disease Control and Prevention found more than 112,000 drug deaths in the latest 12-month period here in the U.S. It's the highest toll of fatal overdoses ever. The big culprit now is street fentanyl, the synthetic opioid produced by the Mexican drug cartels. But it's important to say the U.S. medical industry is still prescribing vastly more pain pills than other countries. Those medications are still killing a lot of Americans - nearly 17,000 fatal overdoses from prescription pills every year. In suing Rite Aid earlier this year, Attorney General Merrick Garland issued a statement saying the Justice Department plans to hold companies accountable for the opioid epidemic that's killing Americans.