Pfizer has agreed to pay $325 million to settle a lawsuit brought by healthcare benefit providers who claimed the drugmaker marketed the epilepsy drug Neurontin for unapproved uses.
The settlement, which needs approval from a federal judge in Boston, would end a case over claims that the company’s Parke-Davis unit schemed to market the drug for unapproved conditions as early as 1994.
The accord was disclosed in court papers filed May 30th in Boston federal court, about six weeks after New York-based Pfizer agreed to a $190 million settlement over Neurontin in a separate case.
The Boston accord will resolve “all third-party payer claims regarding off-label promotion” and state antitrust claims over Neurontin sales, Steve Danehy, a company spokesman, said in a statement. Pfizer didn’t admit wrongdoing, he said.
“After more than 10 years of hard-fought litigation, the parties have reached a settlement that will bring this litigation to a close,” lawyers for the benefit firms said in a memorandum filed May 30th.
The companies alleged that Parke-Davis, part of Warner- Lambert , paid kickbacks to doctors to encourage them to prescribe the anti-seizure drug for unapproved uses such as bipolar and panic disorders. Pfizer acquired Warner-Lambert in 2000 and “deliberately expanded the promotion of off-label uses,” lawyers for the benefits firms said in an amended complaint filed in 2011. – (Bloomberg)
