Boxes of tablets produced by Teva Pharmaceutical Industries.
Chris Ratcliffe | Bloomberg | Getty Images
Teva Pharmaceuticals, a leading drugmaker, has reached an agreement with the U.S. Department of Justice to pay $225 million in criminal fines. The fines are related to allegations of price fixing involving three medications, including a generic cholesterol drug that Teva has agreed to divest.
Glenmark Pharmaceuticals, another company involved in the price fixing scheme, will pay $30 million and divest its version of the cholesterol drug.
This settlement marks the largest fine to date for a domestic antitrust case and is part of a series of cases targeting price fixing in the pharmaceutical industry. Since 2020, the DOJ has charged five other pharmaceutical companies, bringing the total number of resolved cases to seven with more than $681 million in criminal penalties.
Assistant Attorney General Jonathan Kanter of the DOJ’s antitrust division stated, “Today, the Antitrust Division and our law enforcement partners hold two more pharmaceutical companies accountable for raising prices of essential medicines and depriving Americans of affordable access to prescription drugs.”
The agreements reached with Teva and Glenmark are deferred prosecution agreements, meaning the companies will avoid trial and criminal punishment if they comply with the terms. However, failure to do so could result in mandatory debarment from federal health-care programs.
In addition to the fines, Teva has committed to donating $50 million worth of two generic drugs affected by price fixing to humanitarian organizations that provide medications to Americans in need. The company had already set aside $200 million to resolve the allegations.
Teva will make annual payments of $22.5 million from 2024 to 2027, and a final payment of $135 million in 2028.
Glenmark expressed its commitment to being a socially and ethically responsible company and emphasized its efforts to strengthen compliance practices and uphold ethical operating standards.
The companies admitted to their participation in the price fixing schemes, with Glenmark specifically admitting to its involvement in fixing the price of pravastatin, the cholesterol drug.
Teva’s involvement extended to three price-fixing schemes affecting pravastatin, as well as two other drugs: clotrimazole, a skin infection treatment, and tobramycin, a medication commonly used to treat eye infections.
The DOJ had previously charged Glenmark and Teva with one count of price fixing in a filing, and later returned a superseding indictment. Other companies, including Apotex Corp., Taro Pharmaceuticals U.S.A., and Sandoz, were also implicated in the price fixing schemes and have reached their own settlement agreements.
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