The lawsuit stemmed from the botched transfer of infected inmates in May 2020 from a Southern California prison to San Quentin, which at the time had no infections.
The whistleblowers, seeking monetary damages, accused the companies of offering prescription drugs at discounted prices to most customers paying out of pocket, while improperly charging higher rates to the government. Government healthcare programs reimburse pharmacies for dispensing covered drugs to beneficiaries.
Purdue's proposed settlement is not the biggest in a series of opioid-related settlements in recent years that totals over $50 billion, but it is large and closely watched because of the blame many have given the company for its role in sparking the crisis with its marketing of OxyContin starting in the 1990s. The settlement also is the only one so far where some of the money is to go directly to people who lost loved ones or years of their own lives to opioids.
The legislation faces an uncertain fate in a legal and political climate that's made Kansas an outlier on abortion policy among states with GOP-led legislatures. The bill applies not only to "botched" or "unsuccessful" abortions but also when doctors induce labor to deliver a fetus that is expected to die within minutes or even seconds outside the womb, which often occurs because of a severe medical issue.
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