Speaker 1: Welcome to the Bloomberg Law Podcast. I'm June Grosso. Every
Speaker 1: day we bring you insight and analysis into the most
Speaker 1: important legal news of the day. You can find more
Speaker 1: episodes of the Bloomberg Law Podcast on Apple Podcasts, SoundCloud
Speaker 1: and on Bloomberg dot com slash podcasts. Johnson and Johnson
Speaker 1: shares rose as much as five point four per cent
Speaker 1: after an Oklahoma judge ordered the company to pay far
Speaker 1: less than some investors had expected in the first trial
Speaker 1: by a state seeking compensation for the public health crisis
Speaker 1: spawned by opioid pain killers. Bloomberg News legal reporter Jeff
Speaker 1: Feely is on the line with us with what this
Speaker 1: might mean going forward. Jeff, glad to have you with us.
Speaker 1: One eye opener for me. Judge Thad Bachman ruled J
Speaker 1: and J created a temporary public nuisance. That's really how
Speaker 1: we characterized this. Yes, public nuisance is basically a doctor
Speaker 1: and that says if somebody creates a harm that affects
Speaker 1: the community that you know, you can be responsible for it.
Speaker 1: He found that the nuisance that was created was not
Speaker 1: a permanent one, you know, a dam or something like
Speaker 1: that that you know damns up a river, but instead
Speaker 1: a nuisance that can be abated over a short period
Speaker 1: of time, and that's of course treatment of opioid related stuff.
Speaker 1: And there was talk of a duping of doctors. Yes,
Speaker 1: the the idea is that J and J, through its
Speaker 1: marketing tactics, basically dupe doctors into believing that it was
Speaker 1: fine too um prescribe opioids for ailments that weren't approved,
Speaker 1: you know, ailments such as pain relief for dental procedures,
Speaker 1: regular arthritis, you know, things like that. Opioids were not
Speaker 1: created for that purpose. They were created as a you know,
Speaker 1: treat serious pain. And of course the allegation is that
Speaker 1: J and J came up with the you know, this
Speaker 1: expansion so it could boost its profits. So what is
Speaker 1: this likely to mean for J and J and UH
Speaker 1: other drug companies going forward. Well, the the award that
Speaker 1: was handed down, which was equivalent of one year's worth
Speaker 1: of extra resources to combat the opioid problem in Oklahoma,
Speaker 1: was far less than the state had asked for. The
Speaker 1: state had asked for a maximum of seventeen point five
Speaker 1: billion to boost resources over the course of thirty years.
Speaker 1: One of the other significant points about the ruling, however,
Speaker 1: is that For the first time, the U. S. Court
Speaker 1: has endorsed the idea that that governments can use this
Speaker 1: public nuisance theory to hold companies accountable for their marketing
Speaker 1: and sales practices. This is the first time it's been done,
Speaker 1: and there are at least forty five other lawsuits by
Speaker 1: states and more than two thousand lawsuits by cities and
Speaker 1: counties that are relying on the same theory to you know,
Speaker 1: hopefully in their mind, hold opioid makers and distributors liable
Speaker 1: for their mishandling of these drugs. Now, how does this
Speaker 1: ring up? What was the states asking for? What had
Speaker 1: been anticipated? And what does Jane j pay? The state
Speaker 1: had asked the idea of public nuisances that you know
Speaker 1: you've got you've harmed the community, so you have to
Speaker 1: find a way to remedy the harm. The state had
Speaker 1: produced three different plans to remedy the harms created by
Speaker 1: jan Ja's over aggressive marketing of opioids. There was a
Speaker 1: twenty year plan, a twenty five year plan, and a
Speaker 1: thirty year plan. The third year plan, again, the maximum
Speaker 1: that they had sought would have been seventeen point five billion.
Speaker 1: The amount that the judge awarded was something like three
Speaker 1: or four percent of that of that request. So J
Speaker 1: and J will have to pay five hundred and seventy
Speaker 1: two million, which is again the equivalent of one year's
Speaker 1: extra resources for more treatment, more policing, cover hospital costs,
Speaker 1: all tied to the fall out of opioid addictions. Yeah,
Speaker 1: and so what's next in in this opioid prosecution? What's
Speaker 1: next is the first federal case of the consolidated cases
Speaker 1: before Judge Polster in Cleveland is set to go to
Speaker 1: trial October twenty one before a jury in Cleveland. Don't
Speaker 1: forget the Oklahoma case was a non jury case was
Speaker 1: heard by the judge himself. This will be the first
Speaker 1: jury trial first, you know, the first panel to consider
Speaker 1: UH opioid makers and distributors liability for the crisis. So
Speaker 1: is this then seen as a victory for the drug companies?
Speaker 1: Where where does it come down? Well, it's a victory
Speaker 1: for the drug companies, specifically J and J in terms
Speaker 1: of the amount of money that they're required to pay. Again,
Speaker 1: it's a little bit of a pyric victory because the
Speaker 1: judge did find that this public nuisance theory is valid
Speaker 1: and can be used all the other states and cities
Speaker 1: and counties are planning to use that, So that's more
Speaker 1: ammunition for them going forward with more confidence that that
Speaker 1: theory will fly at trial. Again, we don't have no
Speaker 1: idea what the appellate courts in Oklahoma think about this theory,
Speaker 1: and we won't for years probably now. There there had
Speaker 1: been arguments during this trial that the J and J
Speaker 1: was something of a of a kingpin in this crisis.
Speaker 1: How was that portrayed? J and J at one point
Speaker 1: on a couple of companies that grew and processed opium,
Speaker 1: which is used in opioids, you know, as part of
Speaker 1: as the pain the painkilling ingredient. Ah, they sold those
Speaker 1: companies a couple of years ago. But the Oklahoma Attorney
Speaker 1: General made the argument that J and J had a
Speaker 1: stake in every company's opioid painkiller that was marketed in
Speaker 1: the in the state because they provided the active pharmaceutical
Speaker 1: ingredient for that drug. So that's why they were colorfully
Speaker 1: tagged as the kingpin. Of course, the J and J folks,
Speaker 1: you know, I thought that was totally out of bounds,
Speaker 1: using you know, drug cartel language to describe a company
Speaker 1: that operates under FDA regulation and as the world largest
Speaker 1: prodserve healthcare goods. And is there any indication that there
Speaker 1: are going to be a lot more cases or will
Speaker 1: this be wrapped up fairly soon? This will not be
Speaker 1: wrapped up fairly soon. There are settlement talks going on
Speaker 1: both with the states attorneys general and the consolidated cases
Speaker 1: before Judge Poster in Cleveland. Those talks are not progressing
Speaker 1: very quickly from what I can tell, and I suspect
Speaker 1: we're going to see lots of trials come next year
Speaker 1: and our thanks to Bloomberg's Bloomberg News legal reporter Jeff
Speaker 1: Feeley joining us on the line on the opioid trial.
Speaker 1: Thanks for listening to the Bloomberg Law Podcast. You can
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Speaker 1: and on bloomberg dot com slash podcast. I'm June Brosso.
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