The Cherokee tribe announced Tuesday that American drug distributors have agreed to pay them $ 75 million to end lawsuits related to the opioid crisis in the United States.
The out-of-court settlement, reached with the AmerisourceBergen, Cardinal Health and McKesson groups, is the first of its kind involving a Native American tribe.
It “represents an important contribution to the response to the opioid crisis on the Cherokee Nation reserve, a crisis that has negatively and disproportionately affected many of our citizens,” commented its leader Chuck Hoskin, quoted in a report. communicated.
The funds, which will be disbursed over six and a half years, will be used to finance “psychiatric care structures and other programs to help people heal,” he added.
The “Cherokee Nation”, which has 370,000 members in the state of Oklahoma, had filed a complaint in 2017 against distributors of opiates, accused of having overlooked the suspicious orders of these highly addictive pain medications.
In her press release, she specifies that lawsuits against Walmart, Walgreens and CVS pharmacies are continuing and could lead to a trial in a year.
The opiate crisis, at the origin of more than 500,000 deaths by overdose in 20 years in the United States, has triggered a volley of litigation in the United States from direct victims and many communities (cities, counties, States .. .).
Producers, like the Purdue laboratory, were the first targeted, accused of having encouraged, with aggressive marketing strategies, the overprescribing of their products while concealing their highly addictive nature.
Having become addicted, many patients increased their use and eventually turned to illicit drugs like heroin and fentanyl.
The Purdue Lab has agreed to pay $ 4.5 billion to affected victims and institutions in return for some immunity for its owners, the Sackler family.
Johnson & Johnson lab and distributors AmerisourceBergen, Cardinal Health and McKesson have agreed to pay $ 26 billion.
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