Healthcare Fraud Lawyer Blog
If you take medication regularly, why do you take it? Why that specific medicine? Hopefully, the answer is that you take it for a genuine medical need and, along with your doctor and pharmacist, you chose that specific medication because it is the best fit for your medical needs. A lot of attention has been paid in recent years to how money intrudes on medicine, specifically people’s inability to afford the medicines they need. However, money also intrudes in other ways as shown by the long story of Risperdal and the allegations of improper marketing of pharmaceuticals. This is yet another area in which the False Claims Act (“FCA”) can be used to combat health care fraud and our pharmaceutical marketing fraud law firm is prepared to be part of this fight.
The Case of Johnson & Johnson and the $2.2 Billion Settlement
One of the longest Department of Justice (“DOJ”) press releases we’ve read on FCA claims dealt with one of the largest FCA settlements — Johnson & Johnson’s (“J&J”) agreement to pay $2.2 billion to settle a variety of claims involving off-label marketing and kickbacks. The settlement includes both criminal and civil allegations. The claims largely surround the drug Risperdal which, for most of the time involved, was approved only for the treatment of schizophrenia.
