12 Steps Again

Masters Pharmaceutical, Inc. Sold 4.2 Million Doses of Hydrocodone, Phentermine and Alprazolam without Reporting Sales to The United States Drug Enforcement Agency (DEA).

A distributor of branded and generic prescription drugs which operates a facility in Cincinnati, Ohio, Masters Pharmaceutical, Inc. has agreed to pay $500,000 to settle claims that it provided controlled substances to illegally operating Internet pharmacies, and failed to report these suspicious sales to the Drug Enforcement Administration.
 
The settlement agreement covers the sales of more than 4,199,465 dosage units of hydrocodone, phentermine and alprazolam that occurred between 2005 and 2008 and were not reported to the Drug Enforcement Agency.
In the agreement, Masters Pharmaceutical, Inc., without admitting wrongdoing, will pay $500,000, to the United States, with $350,000 of the amount due by May 15. The company will pay $100,000 one year later and the final $50,000 in two years.

Additionally, In a separate memorandum of agreement dated April 1, 2009, Masters Pharmaceutical, Inc., acknowledged that its DEA-registered facility is required to comply with controlled substance record keeping and reporting requirements of DEA. Masters represents that it has taken good-faith actions to detect and prevent diversion including agreeing to implement the policies and procedures that are the subject of the memorandum of agreement.

Masters Pharmaceutical, Inc., has cooperated fully with Drug Enforcement Agency’s investigation and has agreed to continue to cooperate with The Drug Enforcement Agency in reducing the unlawful diversion of controlled substances.

“This agreement will help curb the growing problem of the diversion of prescription drugs for illegal uses,” Lockhart said. “I want to commend the Drug Enforcement Agency Diversion Unit for their efforts in this case.”

Drug Enforcement Agency Special Agent, Corso, stated that “By failing to report suspicious orders for controlled substances that it received from rogue Internet pharmacies, Masters Pharmaceuticals contributed substantially to the explosive growth of prescription drug abuse in this country. This civil penalty demonstrates the Drug Enforcement Agency’s high priority toward cutting off the drug supply to pharmacies engaged in Internet diversion schemes.”

Treating Inmates Has Proven Public Health, Safety, and Economic Benefits

The vast majority of prisoners who could benefit from drug abuse treatment do not receive it, despite two decades of research that demonstrate its effectiveness, according to researchers at the National Institute on Drug Abuse (NIDA), part of the National Institutes of Health.In a report published today in the Journal of the American Medical Association, NIDA scientists note that about half of all prisoners (including some sentenced for non-drug-related offenses) are dependent on drugs, yet less than 20 percent of inmates suffering from drug abuse or dependence receive formal treatment.

“Treating drug-abusing offenders improves public health and safety,” said NIDA Director and report coauthor Dr. Nora D. Volkow. “In addition to the devastating social consequences for individuals and their families, drug abuse exacts serious health effects, including increased risk for infectious diseases such as HIV and hepatitis C; and treatment for addiction can help prevent their spread.Providing drug abusers with treatment also makes it less likely that these abusers will return to the criminal justice system.”

“Addiction is a stigmatized disease that the criminal justice system often fails to view as a medical condition; as a consequence, its treatment is not as available as it is for other medical conditions,” stated Dr. Redonna K. Chandler, the report’s principal author and chief of NIDA’s Services Research Branch.

There are several ways in which drug abuse treatment can be incorporated into the criminal justice system. These include therapeutic alternatives to incarceration, treatment merged with judicial oversight in drug courts, treatments provided in prison and jail, and reentry programs to help offenders transition from incarceration back into the community.

To learn more about the latest research on treatment for drug abusers in the criminal justice system, download NIDA’s Principles of Drug Abuse Treatment for Criminal Justice Populations at http://www.drugabuse.gov/PODAT_CJ/principles.