Cherokee Nation is suing CVS Health, Walgreens, and other drug companies and retailers, alleging the companies didn’t do enough to stop prescription painkillers from flooding the tribal community and creating a crisis of opioid addiction.
The lawsuit, filed in tribal court on Thursday, alleges that the companies failed to properly monitor opioid prescriptions and orders. The tribal government alleges that those patterns should have raised red flags that the companies are legally responsible for reporting to federal officials.
“These drug wholesalers and retailers have profited greatly by allowing the Cherokee Nation to become flooded with prescription opioids,” the lawsuit alleges. “They have habitually turned a blind eye to known or knowable problems in their own supply chains.”
The rate of drug-related deaths among American Indian and Alaska Native people has nearly quadrupled since 1999, according to the Indian Health Service. It’s now double the rate in the US as a whole. Oklahoma — home to most of the 120,000 citizens of Cherokee Nation — leads the country in prescription painkiller abuse.
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