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The Trump administration sued Walmart Inc. Tuesday, accusing the retail giant of helping to fuel the nation’s opioid crisis by inadequately screening for questionable prescriptions despite repeated warnings from its own pharmacists.
The Justice Department’s lawsuit claims that Walmart WMT, -1.43% sought to boost profits, understaffed its pharmacies and pressured employees to fill prescriptions quickly. That made it difficult for pharmacists to reject invalid prescriptions, enabling widespread drug abuse nationwide, the suit alleges. Walmart, the country’s largest retailer by revenue, has been expecting this complaint and sued the federal government in October to fight the allegations pre-emptively.
The Justice Department’s lawsuit alleges Walmart created a system that turned its network of 5,000 in-store U.S. pharmacies into a leading supplier of highly addictive painkillers. The allegations date to June 2013, according to the suit.
Walmart started with cut-rate prices on opioids that initially drove shoppers to its stores, the government alleges. Middle managers—under direction from executives at company headquarters—pressured their pharmacists to work faster, the suit says, believing that quick-fill prescriptions drew customers to stay and keep shopping. Walmart ignored repeated warnings that the company had understaffed its pharmacies, and that pressure to sell quickly was leading to mistakes and putting patient health at risk, according to the complaint.
An expanded version of this report appears at WSJ.com.
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