Teva Pharmaceuticals: Multimillion Settlement to Resolve Fraud Allegations in the USA

Teva Pharmaceuticals has reached a $450 million settlement with the U.S. government to resolve allegations of violating the Anti-Kickback Statute and the False Claims Act. The allegations concern two illegal bribery schemes affecting both Medicare and the pricing of essential drugs. A significant part of the settlement includes $225 million in criminal penalties that Teva USA paid under a previously reached agreement with the Department of Justice. The first scandal revolves around the claim that Teva from 2006 to 2017 supported copayments for Medicare patients with the multiple sclerosis drug Copaxone, violating the law. Teva allegedly used this strategy in cooperation with third parties, including a specialty pharmacy and two ostensibly independent copayment assistance foundations, to direct donations to cover copayments. Prosecutors accuse Teva of misleadingly balancing the price of Copaxone on Medicare, which is clearly prohibited by law. The second charge accuses Teva USA of colluding with other generic drug manufacturers to manipulate prices for drugs like Pravastatin, Clotrimazole, and Tobramycin. The Department of Justice has already secured a deferred prosecution agreement with Teva USA, in which the company admitted involvement in price-fixing. This settlement is part of a comprehensive initiative against bribery and price manipulation in the pharmaceutical industry. Joshua S. Levy, Acting U.S. Attorney for the District of Massachusetts, emphasized that Teva’s manipulation of the foundation process violated the law and undermined Medicare's copayment system. Since 2017, his office has returned more than one billion dollars to Medicare. This settlement is the largest in a series of cases targeting pharmaceutical companies that have unlawfully made copayments through third-party foundations. The Department of Justice has so far collected over a billion dollars from these companies and reached settlements with four foundations and a specialized pharmacy.