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State alleges that pharmaceutical companies provided inflated drug-pricing information.
The Utah Supreme Court has revived a lawsuit that accuses pharmaceutical companies of engaging in a drug-pricing scheme that led to overpayments from the state’s Medicaid program.
In a unanimous decision on Tuesday, the justices said the state can amend its suit to meet a newly clarified standard for how detailed allegations about a widespread scheme must be.
The Attorney General’s Office filed suit in 3rd District Court in May 2008 accusing 17 companies of violations of the Utah False Claims Act and fraudulent misrepresentation. They allegedly provided inflated drug-pricing information to reporting services. The services then published price indices for the medications, including their average wholesale prices, which caused Utah Medicaid to overpay providers, the suit claimed.
The defendants argued that the suit should be thrown out because it did not delineate each individual company’s alleged misconduct.