DANGER AT YOUR DOOR –
March 7, 2025 – The CSA states that narcotics can only be used for “a useful and legitimate medical purpose.” By filling prescriptions that were invalid, the pharmacies “made choices that caused these millions of violations of federal law,” the DOJ alleged in the Walgreens lawsuit. The FCA, for its part, states that entities cannot knowingly present a “false or fraudulent claim” for government payment—either due to “deliberate ignorance” or “reckless disregard” of the claim’s falsehood. The DOJ alleged that by requesting reimbursement from Medicare and Medicaid for illegitimate prescriptions, the pharmacies broke the law. They unlawfully dispensed “massive quantities of opioids and other controlled substances to fuel its own profits at the expense of public health and safety,” the lawsuit against CVS stated.
To substantiate its claims, the government unsealed more than 800 pages associated with the civil complaints that included thousands of “false or fraudulent” prescriptions filed by the pharmacy giants between 2012 and 2024, including hundreds written by clinicians known to operate so-called “pill mills.”
In doing so, the pharmacies not only defrauded taxpayers under the FCA but also helped exacerbate the country’s ongoing fatal overdose crisis by routinely dispensing “extremely high doses and excessive quantities of potent opioids that fed dependence and addiction,” the DOJ alleged in its CVS complaint.
