CVS Pharmacy Inc. and various subsidiaries have agreed to pay $315 million to resolve a Justice Department case alleging it unlawfully dispensed medically unnecessary prescriptions of highly addictive opioids, officials said Tuesday.
The settlement resolves a lawsuit brought in 2024 that accused the healthcare giant of providing massive amounts of opioids and other controlled substances “to fuel its own profits at the expense of public health and safety.”
It’s the latest effort by the federal government to hold accountable companies that officials have alleged helped fuel the U.S. addiction and overdose crisis.
“Today’s settlement is a significant milestone in the Justice Department’s efforts to combat the opioid epidemic by cracking down on pharmacies who unlawfully fulfill prescriptions for controlled substances,” Associate Attorney General Stanley Woodward said in an emailed statement.
CVS said in a statement that its pharmacists were trained “in the safe and appropriate use of all medications” and that it had implemented “best-in-class” programs to help them “make the best decisions on behalf of patients.”
The company said it strongly disagreed with the claims made in the lawsuit and that the settlement admits no wrongdoing.
The company said in 2024 that pharmacists were being held to “vague, undefined, and ever-changing standards of practice” when it comes to filling prescription opioids.
The lawsuit filed under President Joe Biden’s administration accused CVS of violating the Controlled Substances Act by filling illegitimate prescriptions for high doses of potent opioids that “fed dependence and addiction.”
The Justice Department alleged it dispensed large quantities of opioids based on prescriptions from known “pill mills,” or providers that hand out prescriptions for drugs without a legitimate medical purpose.
It alleged that poor staffing levels coupled with performance metrics and incentive compensation policies implemented by the company led to pharmacists racing to fill prescriptions without confirming they were legitimate.
The prescriptions were often billed to and reimbursed by Medicaid and other federal healthcare programs, the lawsuit says.
Under the settlement, CVS must also “implement additional safeguards to ensure that prescriptions for opioids and other controlled substances are dispensed only when medically appropriate,” Assistant Attorney General Brett Shumate, who leads the Justice Department’s Civil Division, said in a statement.
Over the last decade, drugmakers, wholesalers, pharmacies and other companies have agreed to settlements with governments in the U.S. totaling over $50 billion.
Most of the money is intended to go to address the crisis, which has been linked to more than 100,000 deaths in the U.S. some years, though the numbers have fallen sharply recently.
Most of the settlements — and dollars — have been with state and local governments, but the U.S. has reached several deals, including in the last two years with the pharmacies Walgreens and Walmart.
