A global opioid maker owned by the Sackler family is now selling an opioid overdose cure. One critic calls it a ‘deeply cynical' move.
This Dec. 12, 2019, photo shows a sign at the Mundipharma International headquarters at Cambridge Science Park in England. Mundipharma is the international affiliate of Purdue Pharma, the maker of the blockbuster painkiller OxyContin. Mundipharma is now marketing Nyxoid, a new brand of naloxone, an opioid overdose reversal medication.
“The way that they’ve pushed their opioids initially and now coming up with the expensive kind of antidote -- it’s something that just strikes me as deeply, deeply cynical,” said Ross Bell, executive director of the New Zealand Drug Foundation and a longtime advocate of greater naloxone availability. “You’ve got families devastated by this, and a company who sees dollar signs flashing.
In internal documents, the lawsuits allege, Purdue illustrated the connection they had publicly denied between opioids and addiction with a graphic of a blue funnel. The top end was labeled “Pain treatment.” The bottom: “opioid addiction treatment.” The slideshow said they had an opportunity to become an “end-to-end provider” — opioids on the front end, and addiction treatment on the back end.
Project Tango stalled. It was revised the next year with a new plan to sell naloxone, the lawsuits allege. In the document, the company suggested that officials change the country’s laws to allow for easier access to naloxone, get naloxone into needle exchange programs, detox centers and supervised injecting clinics, and establish a national, free take-home naloxone program.
Mundipharma also paid for a drug policy institute’s study on naloxone that the federal government ultimately used as a blueprint for a 10 million Australian dollar pilot program to distribute naloxone, including Nyxoid. And in October, Australian Health Minister Greg Hunt announced that Australia’s government would subsidize Nyxoid prescriptions, meaning it costs Australians as little as AU$6.50 per pack, versus around AU$50 without the subsidy.
Grand, the spokesman for Mundipharma Europe, also rejected any link between the company’s Nyxoid strategy and Project Tango, saying that the European company and Purdue have separate managements, boards and strategies.
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