Four midstate counties join $26 billion global opioid settlement 

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Dauphin, Lancaster, Lebanon and York counties have joined Pennsylvania as part of a $26 billion global settlement agreement with four companies embroiled in the opioid crisis. 

Attorney General Josh Shapiro announced in July that pharmaceutical distributors Cardinal, McKesson and AmerisourceBergen and Johnson & Johnson, which manufactured and marketed opioids, agreed to deliver up to $26 billion to address the opioid crisis. 

Fifty Pennsylvania counties have now agreed to join the settlement to bring an expected $1 billion to the commonwealth, Shapiro said in a statement on Wednesday. Within the midstate, Adams and Cumberland counties have yet to join the agreement. 

The settlement comes after more than three years of investigations by state attorneys general into whether the three distributors refused to ship opioids to pharmacies that submitted suspicious drug orders and whether Johnson & Johnson misled patients and doctors about the addictive nature of opioid drugs. 

Each of the companies have accepted 10-year agreements as part of the settlement, which includes court orders to stop selling opioids, provide aggregated data about where drugs are going and more. Along with the 10-year agreements, Johnson & Johnson will pay up to $5 billion over the next nine years, and the three distributors will collectively pay $21 billion over 18 years. 

“Pennsylvania lost 5,172 lives to overdoses in the last year alone, which is 14 Pennsylvanians a day,” said Shapiro. “This settlement is going to provide resources to jumpstart programs that will change lives and impact families across our Commonwealth who are struggling to find treatment and help for those suffering with substance abuse. These funds will be earmarked to offer and expand life-saving treatment options, prioritizing the areas that have been most affected by this crisis.” 

Shapiro added that the state expects to see up to $232 million from the settlement in 2022. Counties who have signed on to the settlement will decide where funds will be allocated, but every dollar of the money will be used to combat the opioid crisis, said Shapiro.