{"id":136200,"date":"2020-12-17T23:17:17","date_gmt":"2020-12-17T20:17:17","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/en.buradabiliyorum.com\/sacklers-apologize-but-deflect-blame-at-opioid-hearing\/"},"modified":"2020-12-17T23:17:17","modified_gmt":"2020-12-17T20:17:17","slug":"sacklers-apologize-but-deflect-blame-at-opioid-hearing","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/buradabiliyorum.com\/en\/sacklers-apologize-but-deflect-blame-at-opioid-hearing\/","title":{"rendered":"#Sacklers apologize but deflect blame at opioid hearing"},"content":{"rendered":"

“#Sacklers apologize but deflect blame at opioid hearing<\/strong>”
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Two members of the wealthy\u00a0Sackler\u00a0family who own OxyContin maker Purdue Pharma LP offered apologies on Thursday for the role the prescript<\/a>ion painkiller has played in the deadly US opioid epidemic but sought to deflect personal responsibility in response to withering criticism from lawmakers.<\/p>\n

Testifying remotely during a hearing before the House Oversight Committee, David and Kathe\u00a0Sackler, both of whom previously served on Purdue\u2019s board, insisted they were assured by management that the company was meeting regulatory and legal requirements as the opioid crisis unfolded.<\/p>\n

The two, among several\u00a0Sackler\u00a0family members with ownership interests in Purdue, agreed to testify only after the committee\u2019s chairwoman, Democratic Rep. Carolyn Maloney, threatened subpoenas.<\/p>\n

\u201cWatching you testify makes my blood boil,\u201d Democratic Rep. Jim Cooper told David\u00a0Sackler. \u201cI\u2019m not sure that I\u2019m aware of any family in America that\u2019s more evil than yours.\u201d<\/p>\n

Cooper was among the committee members who directed fury at the\u00a0Sacklers for reaping billions of dollars from Purdue as Americans became addicted to opioids. The lawmakers compared them to imprisoned Mexican drug lord Joaquin \u201cEl Chapo\u201d Guzman and showed slides of expensive real estate holdings.<\/p>\n

\u201cWhat you\u2019ve heard from the press about the\u00a0Sacklers is almost certainly wrong and highly distorted,\u201d David\u00a0Sackler\u00a0testified. \u201cWe also fully acknowledge that there is an opioid crisis that has ruined too many lives, and that OxyContin addiction and abuse played a role in that. We are truly sorry to everyone who\u2019s lost a family member or suffered from the scourge of addiction.\u201d<\/p>\n

But\u00a0Sackler\u00a0said he acted legally and ethically while on Purdue\u2019s board.<\/p>\n

His cousin, Kathe\u00a0Sackler, detailed her experience losing a 23-year-old brother to suicide. As a mother, she said, her \u201cheart breaks\u201d for parents who have lost children to opioids.<\/p>\n

\u201cIt distresses me greatly and angers me greatly that the medication that was developed to help people \u2026 has become associated with so much human suffering,\u201d she said. \u201cI am happy to apologize to the American people.\u201d<\/p>\n

\u2018I HAVE STRUGGLED\u2019<\/p>\n

Maloney asked her whether she would apologize for her personal role in the epidemic.\u00a0\u00a0<\/p>\n

\u201cI have struggled with that question. I have tried to figure out: Is there anything that I could have done differently knowing what I knew then, not what I know now?\u201d Kathe\u00a0Sackler\u00a0responded.<\/p>\n

\u201cThere\u2019s nothing that I can find that I would have done differently based on what I believed and understood then, and what I learned from management in the reports to the board, and what I learned from my colleagues on the board,\u201d she added.<\/p>\n

The hearing began with family members of opioid victims sharing stories of personal loss, including the father of an 18-year-old woman on the cusp of attending college who took one OxyContin pill and died.<\/p>\n

Under a settlement with the Justice Department, Purdue pleaded guilty in November to criminal charges for misconduct with its opioids and agreed to more than $8 billion in penalties that will mostly go unpaid.\u00a0Sackler\u00a0family members agreed to pay $225 million to settle civil claims they disputed. Neither they, nor other individuals, were criminally charged.<\/p>\n

The opioid epidemic has claimed the lives of roughly 450,000 Americans since 1999 due to overdoses from prescription painkillers and illegal substances such as heroin and fentanyl.<\/p>\n

Purdue reaped more than $30 billion from opioid sales over the years that enriched\u00a0Sackler\u00a0family members, and it funneled illegal kickbacks to doctors and pharmacies, investigations have found. The drugmaker, which filed for bankruptcy protection last year, and its\u00a0Sackler\u00a0family owners are in discussions to settle thousands of lawsuits from US communities seeking to hold alleged perpetrators responsible for fueling the epidemic.<\/p>\n

Purdue Chief Executive Craig Landau, an anesthesiologist, also testified at the hearing, noting his work treating pain, including with troops wounded in Iraq and Afghanistan as part of the U.S. Army Reserve. He expressed contrition and pointed to Purdue\u2019s guilty pleas.<\/p>\n

Lawmakers pressed the\u00a0Sacklers on more than $10 billion that Purdue transferred over the course of a decade, much of which went to family members.<\/p>\n

Maloney cited a 2007 email from David\u00a0Sackler, a week after a Purdue affiliate pleaded guilty to misbranding OxyContin, in which he questioned whether the family\u2019s wealth would withstand possible future litigation.<\/p>\n

David\u00a0Sackler\u00a0said he was unaware then that Purdue and family members would face the opioid litigation barrage that later materialized.<\/p>\n

\u201cNo,\u201d David\u00a0Sackler\u00a0responded when Maloney asked whether the family was cashing out, leaving less money for plaintiffs in opioid lawsuits.<\/p>\n

\u201cI also am very angry,\u201d Kathe\u00a0Sackler\u00a0said. \u201cI\u2019m angry that some people at Purdue broke the law. I\u2019m angry about it from 2007 and I\u2019m angry about it now, again, in 2020.\u201d<\/p>\n

Rep. James Comer, the committee\u2019s top Republican, emphasized he was pro-business.<\/p>\n

\u201cBut there are bad actors,\u201d Comer said. \u201cAnd to the\u00a0Sackler\u00a0family and Purdue Pharma, let me be as clear as I can be: You all are bad actors. And there is no excuse for what you did.\u201d\u00a0\n <\/p><\/div>\n

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Source<\/a><\/span><\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

“#Sacklers apologize but deflect blame at opioid hearing” Two members of the wealthy\u00a0Sackler\u00a0family who own OxyContin maker Purdue Pharma LP offered apologies on Thursday for the role the prescription painkiller has played in the deadly US opioid epidemic but sought to deflect personal responsibility in response to withering criticism from lawmakers. Testifying remotely during a…<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":136201,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"fifu_image_url":"https:\/\/nypost.com\/wp-content\/uploads\/sites\/2\/2020\/12\/sacklers-offer-opioid-apology.jpg?quality=90&strip=all&w=1200","fifu_image_alt":"","footnotes":""},"categories":[70897],"tags":[86788,52214,71062,75876],"class_list":["post-136200","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-news","tag-12-17-20","tag-congress","tag-opioids","tag-purdue"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/buradabiliyorum.com\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/136200","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/buradabiliyorum.com\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/buradabiliyorum.com\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/buradabiliyorum.com\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/buradabiliyorum.com\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=136200"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/buradabiliyorum.com\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/136200\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/buradabiliyorum.com\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/136201"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/buradabiliyorum.com\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=136200"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/buradabiliyorum.com\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=136200"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/buradabiliyorum.com\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=136200"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}