Deal coverspastand future costs oftreatment, education and intervention 

ALBUQUERQUE, N.M. – The U.S. District Court for the District of New Mexico has approved $651 million in four nationwide class action settlements on behalf of acute care hospitals impacted by the opioid epidemic.  

The settlements also make available an additional $49 million of the opioid antagonist Naloxone for hospitals across the nation. The settlements were achieved by a group of class representative hospitals in negotiations with the nation’s largest manufacturers and distributors of opioid medications.   

The hospitals sought reimbursement from four classes of corporate defendants and affiliates for their collective failure to control the proliferation and abuse of opioids. The settlements, approved yesterday by U.S. District Judge Kea W. Riggs in Albuquerque, allows acute care hospitals to be reimbursed for the enormous expenditures they have incurred in fighting the epidemic, including unreimbursed treatment costs, community education and intervention programs.  

“We’re very pleased these defendants recognized their responsibility to the thousands of acute care hospitals who have been on the front lines of the opioid epidemic for decades,” says Warren Burns of Burns Charest LLP, an original attorney in the litigation and member of the settlement class counsel team.  

The settling defendants include pharmaceutical companies such as Janssen, Johnson & Johnson, Teva, and Allergan, and pharmaceutical distributors including Cardinal Health, McKesson Corporation, and Cencora (formerly known as AmerisourceBergen).  

The case is San Miguel Hospital Corporation, et al. v. Publix Supermarket et al., Case No. 23-cv-00903-KWR-JFR in the U.S. District Court for the District of New Mexico. 

Burns Charest LLP is a thriving boutique litigation firm of experienced, respected attorneys with impressive records representing clients in important and high-profile cases. This work includes serving as co-lead counsel in multidistrict litigation, antitrust and class action matters, as well as oil and gas royalty disputes, environmental pollution cases, large-scale mass torts and complex commercial litigation. The firm has offices in Dallas, New Orleans, New York and Washington, D.C.   

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