Ohio sues 5 drug companies over opioid crisis

Ohio Attorney General MikeDeWine said on Wednesday his office sued five drugmanufacturers, accusing them of misrepresenting the risks ofprescription opioid painkillers, helping fuel a drug addictionepidemic.

A growing number of state and local governments are suingdrugmakers and distributors, seeking to hold them accountablefor the opioid crisis.

The five companies Ohio sued were Purdue Pharma LP, Johnson& Johnson'sJanssen Pharmaceuticals Inc unit, a unit ofEndo International Plc, Teva Pharmaceutical IndustriesLtd'sCephalon unit and Allergan Plc, DeWinesaid during a press conference in Columbus livestreamed online.

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Janssen spokesman Jessica Castles Smith said in an emailedstatement: "The allegations in this lawsuit are both legally andfactually unfounded."

She said Janssen has acted responsibly regarding its opioidpain medications, which are approved by the U.S. Food and DrugAdministration and carry FDA-mandated warnings on their labelsabout the drugs' known risks.

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Purdue, which makes Oxycontin, said in an emailed statement:"We share the attorney general's concerns about the opioidcrisis and we are committed to working collaboratively to findsolutions."

Allergan and Teva declined to comment. Endo could notimmediately be reached.

Crosses spectrum of society

The suit, filed in Southern Ohio where addiction has hithard, seeks damages for the money the state has spent on thefallout, DeWine said.

Opioid drugs, including prescription painkillers and heroin,killed more than 33,000 people in the United States in 2015,more than any year on record, according to the U.S. Centers forDisease Control and Prevention.

In Michigan, a new unit isprosecuting crimes involving heroinand other opioid-based drugs as the state confronts an overdose epidemic that claimed almost 2,000lives in 2015, Attorney General Bill Schuette said Wednesday.

The four-person Opioid Trafficking and Interdiction Unit in Schuette's office is designed to help localauthorities target the supply of prescription drugs from dealers and doctors who are overprescribing. Itwas quietly launched in the fall and has netted six convictions. Fifteen other people are facing charges.

"It crosses the entire spectrum of our society. It really spares no one," Schuette said of opioid abuseduring the Detroit Regional Chamber's Mackinac Policy Conference, where he was flanked byGenesee County Prosecutor David Leytonhis opponent in the 2010 election and Schuette's chiefdeputy Matthew Schneider.

Schneider said the attorney general's office historically has partnered with county prosecutors oncold case investigations, murder probes and appellate cases.

"We are now reaching out on opioids, drug abuse cases. We've never done that before," he said.

The unit cooperates with local, state and federal authorities and focuses on major cases that crossstate or county lines and involve high volumes of heroin and other opioid-based drugs. The unit plansto use what Schneider said is an underutilized law that allows murder charges against people whodeliver drugs that cause someone to die.