Sunday, October 20

Tag: opioids

Consulting firm McKinsey agrees to $78 million settlement with insurers over opioids
30Dec By adminNo Comments
Money

Consulting firm McKinsey agrees to $78 million settlement with insurers over opioids

Consulting firm McKinsey and Co. has agreed to pay $78 million to settle claims from insurers and health care funds that its work with drug companies helped fuel an opioid addiction crisis.The agreement was revealed late Friday in documents filed in federal court in San Francisco. The settlement must still be approved by a judge.Under the agreement, McKinsey would establish a fund to reimburse insurers, private benefit plans and others for some or all of their prescription opioid costs. The insurers argued that McKinsey worked with Purdue Pharma – the maker of OxyContin – to create and employ aggressive marketing and sales tactics to overcome doctors' reservations about the highly addictive drugs. Insurers said that forced them to pay for prescription o...
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FDA warns about Neptune’s Fix tianeptine supplements after reports of seizures, hospitalizations
23Nov By adminNo Comments
Health

FDA warns about Neptune’s Fix tianeptine supplements after reports of seizures, hospitalizations

The Food and Drug Administration is warning consumers not to use or purchase any products from the supplement brand called Neptune's Fix after receiving multiple reports of severe reactions, including seizures and hospitalizations. The FDA says it is testing samples for illegal and harmful ingredients.Neptune's Fix supplements purport to contain tianeptine, an opioid alternative prescribed as an antidepressant in some Latin American, Asian and European countries. Tianeptine is not approved for use in the U.S.The FDA has previously warned about this "potentially dangerous" substance, which the agency says has been linked to addiction and deadly overdoses.   The FDA is warning consumers to not purchase or use Neptune's Fix products, or any other product with tianeptine, wh...
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Movie Review: ‘Pain Hustlers’ tells a sadly familiar story with a kitchen-sink style
26Oct By adminNo Comments
Entertainment

Movie Review: ‘Pain Hustlers’ tells a sadly familiar story with a kitchen-sink style

The wife of a man who nearly died of an opioid overdose comes bursting into the office of the sleazy doctor who prescribed it, wrongly, in exchange for personal gain. She slugs the doctor, in her agony.The scene comes deep into the new Netflix film “Pain Hustlers,” and it feels bracingly real and tragic.If only the rest of the movie, the latest in a string of opioid-themed films, felt the same. Instead, despite a high-powered cast featuring a reliably solid Emily Blunt, an expertly low-life Chris Evans and the gifted Catherine O’Hara, the film tries too hard to be something it isn’t, or shouldn’t be: slick and breezy and too clever for its own good, filled with mockumentary interviews, wild montages, and other tricks used to more disciplined effect in more accomplished films.Not that Blun...
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Rite Aid files for bankruptcy amid opioid-related lawsuits and falling sales
16Oct By adminNo Comments
Money

Rite Aid files for bankruptcy amid opioid-related lawsuits and falling sales

Philadelphia — Major U.S. pharmacy chain Rite Aid said Sunday that it has filed for bankruptcy and obtained $3.45 billion in fresh financing as it carries out a restructuring plan while coping with falling sales and opioid-related lawsuits.In 2022, Rite Aid settled for up to $30 million to resolve lawsuits alleging pharmacies contributed to an oversupply of prescription opioids. It said it had reached an agreement with its creditors on a financial restructuring plan to cut its debt and position itself for future growth and that the bankruptcy filing was part of that process. The plan will "significantly reduce the company's debt" while helping to "resolve litigation claims in an equitable manner," Rite Aid said. In March, the Justic...
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Drug dealer in crew blamed for actor Michael K. Williams’ overdose death gets 5 years in prison
11Oct By adminNo Comments
Entertainment

Drug dealer in crew blamed for actor Michael K. Williams’ overdose death gets 5 years in prison

A member of a New York City drug-dealing crew blamed for the fentanyl-laced heroin death of actor Michael KByThe Associated PressOctober 10, 2023, 8:14 PMFILE - Michael K. Williams arrives at the Vanity Fair Oscar Party on Feb. 9. 2020, in Beverly Hills, Calif. A member of a New York City drug-dealing crew blamed for the fentanyl-laced heroin death of actor Williams was sentenced Tuesday, Oct. 10, 2023, to five years in prison. Luis Cruz was the third of four defendants to be sentenced in connection with the drugs linked to the September 2021 death of Williams. (Photo by Evan Agostini/Invision/AP, File)The Associated PressNEW YORK -- A member of a New York City drug-dealing crew blamed for the fentanyl-laced heroin death of actor Michael K. Williams was sentenced Tuesday to five years in ...
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‘Euphoria’ star Angus Cloud overdosed on meth, cocaine, fentanyl, coroner says
21Sep By adminNo Comments
Entertainment

‘Euphoria’ star Angus Cloud overdosed on meth, cocaine, fentanyl, coroner says

A Northern California coroner's office says actor Angus Cloud died in July of an overdose of cocaine, fentanyl and other substancesByThe Associated PressSeptember 21, 2023, 1:34 PMFILE - Angus Cloud arrives at the Vanity Fair Oscar Party on March 27, 2022, in Beverly Hills, Calif. Cloud, the actor who starred as the drug dealer Fezco "Fez" O'Neill on the HBO series "Euphoria," died of an overdose of cocaine, fentanyl and other substances, a Northern California coroner's office said Thursday. He died July 31 at his family home in Oakland, Calif. He was 25. (Photo by Evan Agostini/Invision/AP, File)The Associated PressOAKLAND, Calif. -- Actor Angus Cloud died in July of an overdose of cocaine, fentanyl and other substances, a Northern California coroner's office said Thursday. Cloud's cause...
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