THE US Department of Justice has filed a lawsuit in Illinois against pharmacy giant Walgreens, accusing it of systematically pushing pharmacists to fill opioid prescriptions with "obvious red flags" quickly, helping drive unnecessary deaths and the opioid crisis.
In doing so, Walgreens management is said to have ignored its own pharmacists, internal data, and legal obligations around prescribed controlled substances to fill orders fast.
The suit, filed last week, alleges that between 2012 and the present, Walgreens "knowingly filled millions of prescriptions for controlled substances that lacked a legitimate medical purpose".
"This lawsuit seeks to hold Walgreens accountable for the many years that it failed to meet its obligations when dispensing dangerous opioids and other drugs," Deputy Assistant Attorney General Brian Boynton, head of the Justice Department's Civil Division, said in a statement.
"These practices allowed millions of opioid pills and other controlled substances to flow illegally out of Walgreens stores," he added.
In some cases, "patients died after overdosing on opioids shortly after filling unlawful prescriptions at Walgreens", the Justice Department said.
Similar suits in Baltimore and Philadelphia resulted in Walgreens settling, with a suit in Ohio pending.
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