A company owned by the Sackler family — widely blamed for being a major early driver of the opioid epidemic — continues to rake in overseas overdose sales, though a rep said the company doesn’t profit from those sales.
The Sackler family, best known for its ownership of OxyContin maker Purdue Pharma, also owns the international pharmaceutical company Mundipharma. The company pushes its overdose antidote, a naloxone nasal spray called Nyxoid, overseas.
“You’re in the business of selling addictive drugs and overdoses, and now you’re in the business of selling addictive drugs and overdoses?” Dr. Andrew Kolodny, an outspoken critic of Purdue, told the Associated Press in 2019. “He’s pretty smart, isn’t he?”
People from across the United States who have lost loved ones to the opioid epidemic rallied at the Justice Department in Washington DC and blamed the Sackler family and their company, Purdue Pharma, for overdose deaths. (Michael Nigro/Pacific Press/LightRocket via Getty Images)
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A spokesman for Mundipharma stressed that the company is not active in the US market.
“Mundipharma distributes Nyxoid in several countries outside the United States,” the spokesperson told Fox News. “He doesn’t profit from those sales.”
The spokesman also told Fox News that “it is public knowledge that our shareholders intend to sell Mundipharma within seven years” of a Purdue bankruptcy plan going into effect. “We have no additional information or details to share at this time about those sales.”
In 2019, meanwhile, a spokesman for Mundipharma Europe told the AP that overdose drugs given as a nasal spray are important given the dismal rate of overdose deaths.
“If they were trying to find a solution, they would just give out naloxone for free,” Stephen Wood, a fellow at the Harvard Medical School Center for Bioethics, told the AP. “They could use all that money they made on opioids to help support a program where they’re giving away this life-saving drug.”
Profits from OxyContin helped make the Sacklers one of the wealthiest families in the world. But in recent years, Purdue and its private owners have faced lawsuits accusing them of carrying out an aggressive and deceptive marketing campaign that pushes OxyContin prescriptions while downplaying the drug’s dependence.
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A common story emerged: One OxyContin user became addicted, then turned to heroin once the prescription drug became too expensive or difficult to obtain illicitly.
In some cases, these were legitimate patients who followed prescribing guidelines, while others started taking OxyContin more frequently when they felt its effects diminished. Some have taken the drug illegally while experimenting in their youth, often from a family member’s medicine cabinet, without understanding its addictive nature.
The lawsuits against Purdue and Sacklers say internal documents indicate the company aimed to profit from the addiction. According to the plaintiffs, one said Purdue could become an “end-to-end provider” providing both opioids and addiction treatment, the AP reported.
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One proponent sought to raise awareness of opioid addiction with his “Pill Man” sculpture. (Michael Nigro/Pacific Press/LightRocket via Getty Images)
Sackler family representatives at the time said a third party presented the plan and it was dropped after a few passing mentions. The Mundipharma spokesman rejected any link between Nyxoid’s international push and any Purdue plans for naloxone.
Opioid overdoses have been on the rise since the 1990s, but there was a significant spike as the COVID-19 pandemic took hold. In 2021, there were more than 80,000 overdose deaths, an approximately 60 percent increase from 2019, according to the National Institutes of Health.
As a result of the opioid epidemic there has been a need for a drug to reverse overdose, especially one as easy to use as Nyxoid overseas. In the United States, naloxone has become synonymous with a similar nasal spray product, Narcan.
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In Philadelphia, home to one of America’s most popular outdoor drug markets, firefighters and EMS administered naloxone nearly 19,600 times between 2014 and 2019, the most recent full year with data available , according to city data.
But the drug is not a universal solution.
“Once they get Narcan in their system, it puts them on immediate withdrawal,” Frank Rodriguez, a recovering drug addict, told Fox News. “They have to get high again so they don’t feel like they’re dying.”
He said he always makes sure he has naloxone on hand whenever he drives around town.
“That saved my life,” he said, lifting Narcan up.
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Frank Rodriguez hands out a dose of Narcan. Addict turned activist keeps drugs in his glove compartment and has them prepped every time he pulls into Philadelphia (Fox News)
Regardless of the need for an easy-to-use overdose reverse drug, Mundipharma has been criticized for pushing out of Nyxoid after the company’s owners profited from opioids.
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Efforts by the Sackler family to sell Mundipharma’s China unit for $1 billion collapsed in January 2022, Bloomberg reported at the time. There have been no other public reports indicating that Mundipharma or any of its units have been sold.
Purdue Pharma and the Sackler family have been involved in a litany of court cases in recent years. The pharmaceutical company pleaded guilty to misbranding and fraud charges in 2007 and again in 2020.
Purdue filed for bankruptcy in 2019, but legal proceedings are ongoing. The company offered a $6 billion settlement, funded by the Sacklers, that would be paid to various addiction victims, including states and hospitals. In exchange for that settlement, which is still under consideration, the family would be protected from future opioid lawsuits.
