Johnson & Johnson, Distributors Reach $590M Opioid Settlement For Tribe Claims: Report

Johnson & Johnson JNJ and the three U.S. drug distributors agreed to pay about $590 million to resolve claims from over 400 Native American tribes to settle lawsuits over the opioid epidemic.

• That proposed settlement, though, did not resolve lawsuits and potential claims by the country's 574 federally recognized Native American tribes and Alaska Native villages, which experienced disproportionately high rates of opioid overdoses.
• The deal came after the distributors, McKesson Corporation MCK, AmerisourceBergen Corp  ABC, Cardinal Health Inc CAH, and JNJ, proposed paying up to $26 billion to resolve similar claims by states and local governments.
• The three distributors will pay nearly $440 million over seven years, on top of a $75 million settlement they reached with the Cherokee Nation.
• J&J agreed to pay $150 million over two years, according to a court filing in federal court in Cleveland, Ohio, funds the drugmaker said will be deducted from its $5 billion portion of the $26 billion settlement.
• Johnson & Johnson said that the settlement did not represent an admission of wrongdoing.
• A federal judge in West Virginia is considering whether to hold the three distributors liable for fueling the epidemic in communities there, and Washington state is seeking $95 billion from them in an ongoing trial.
• Price Action: JNJ shares are up 0.47% at $171.70 during the market session on the last check Wednesday.