Kentucky attorney general targets another big pharmacy benefit manager in opioid-related lawsuit

FRANKFORT, Ky. — Kentucky’s attorney general has expanded an opioid-related lawsuit to target another big pharmacy benefit manager that he claims contributed to the state’s deadly addiction crisis. When it was sued in September, Express Scripts responded that it has long worked to combat opioid overuse and abuse and would “vigorously contest these baseless allegations in court.” Coleman initially filed the legal action in a state court, but the two sides are wrangling over whether it should be in state or federal court, his office said. Government lawsuits against pharmacy benefit managers are the latest frontier – and maybe the last big one – in years of litigation over the opioid-related drug epidemic in the U.S. Drugmakers, wholesalers and pharmacy chains have already faced stacks of lawsuits and settled many of them, with most of the money required to be used to fight the overdose and addiction crisis. Drug overdose deaths in Kentucky fell nearly 10% in 2023, marking a second straight annual decline, but state leaders say fatalities remain tragically high and the fight against the drug epidemic is far from over.