Filing: OxyContin maker forecast ‘blizzard of prescriptions’

BOSTON – A member of the family that owns OxyContin maker Purdue Pharma told people at the prescription opioid painkiller’s launch party in the 1990s that it would be “followed by a blizzard of prescriptions that will bury the competition,” according to court documents filed Tuesday.

The details were made public in a case brought by Massachusetts Attorney General Maura Healey that accuses Purdue Pharma, its executives and the Sackler family of deceiving patients and doctors about the risks of opioids and pushing prescribers to keep patients on the drug longer. The documents provide new information about former Purdue Pharma President Richard Sackler’s role in overseeing sales of OxyContin.

Sackler, then senior vice-president responsible for sales, told the audience at the launch party to imagine a series of natural disasters: an earthquake, volcanic eruption, hurricane and blizzard, according to the court filing. He said the “prescription blizzard” would be “deep, dense, and white,” according to the documents.

“Over the next twenty years, the Sacklers made Richard’s boast come true,” lawyers in the attorney general’s office wrote. “They created a manmade disaster. Their blizzard of dangerous prescriptions buried children and parents and grandparents across Massachusetts, and the burials continue,” they wrote.

Purdue Pharma accused the attorney general’s office of cherry-picking from millions of emails and documents to create “biased and inaccurate characterizations” of the company and its executives. The company said in a statement said it will “aggressively defend against these misleading allegations.”

Messages seeking comment were left with a spokeswoman for the Sackler family.

The Massachusetts case is one of hundreds filed by state and local governments seeking to hold the drug industry responsible for the opioid crisis. More than 1,500 of the cases are consolidated under one federal judge in Cleveland; this Massachusetts case is not among those.

The Massachusetts case is the first state to personally name the company’s executives in a complaint. It names 16 current and former executives and board members, including CEO Craig Landau, Richard Sackler and other members of the Sackler family.

___

Mulvihill reported from New Jersey.