Pfizer is set to pay nearly $60 million for a migraine drug at the same time Lady Gaga promoted it.
Pfizer Chairman and CEO Albert Burla breaks down the companies’ earnings on Claman’s count.
Pharmaceutical giant Pfizer will pay nearly $60 million to settle charges that it defrauded Medicare and other federal health care programs by prescribing specific migraine drugs to patients.
The Justice Department said Friday that Biohaven paid improper payments, including speaker honoraria and meals at high-end restaurants, to health care professionals to encourage them to prescribe Migraine Nurtech ODT in violation of the anti-kickback law.
The scheme runs from March 1, 2020 to September 30, 2022. Pfizer acquired Biohaven in October 2022.
The Pfizer Inc. logo is displayed on a staff lab at the company’s research and development facility in Cambridge, Massachusetts. Pfizer will pay nearly $60 million to settle the back pay. (Scott Eason/Bloomberg via Getty Images/Getty Images)
PFIZER’s PAXLOVID failed as a 15-day treatment for chronic Covid, study finds
Prosecutors said that some attorneys who attended multiple speaker programs on the same subject did not receive any educational benefit from attending repeated programs, and that some of Biohoven’s speaker programs were attended by individuals with no educational interest, such as the speakers’ spouses, family members, or the like. Friends or colleagues from the speaker’s medical practice.
Pfizer paid $11.5 billion to buy Biohaven and cut Nurtech speaker programs.
“Patients need to know that their doctors are prescribing drugs based on their own medical judgment and not because of financial incentives from pharmaceutical companies,” said Trini E. Ross, US Attorney for the Western District of New York. “This settlement demonstrates our commitment to holding those who violate the law accountable, regardless of their status or reputation.”
A woman walks in front of Pfizer headquarters in New York City. Pfizer will pay nearly $60 million to settle the back pay. (Eduardo Munoz Alvarez/VIEWpress)
In an ongoing study, once-daily weight loss pills PFIZER AVANCES
Pfizer did not admit wrongdoing in agreeing to settle.
“We are pleased to put this legacy issue behind us so we can focus on patient needs,” the New York-based drugmaker said in a statement.
Nurtec ODT, also known as Rimegepant, was approved for the treatment of acute migraine in February 2020, and its approval was extended in June 2021 for the prevention of episodic migraine. The drug was introduced in 2023 by singer Lady Gaga, she said in a social media post. She has suffered from migraines since she was a child and said she wishes she had found the medicine sooner.
Civil settlement In August 2021, a federal court in Rochester, New York settled a lawsuit filed by former Biohaven Neuroscience salesperson Patricia Frataccio.
Lady Gaga attends the photocall for “Joker: Folly a Dieu” at the Palazzo del Casino during the 81st Venice International Film Festival on September 4, 2024 in Venice, Italy. Gaga introduced the drug in 2023. (Stefan Cardinal – Corbis/Corbis via Getty Images/Getty Images)
Get FOX BUSINESS on the go by clicking here
She will receive about $8.4 million from the settlement. About $41.8 million will go to the federal government and $9.5 million to state Medicaid programs.
The False Claims Act allows whistleblowers to file lawsuits on behalf of the government and share in their recovery.
Meanwhile, the Anti-Kickback Act prohibits giving or paying any price to induce a referral for goods or services covered by Medicare, Medicaid, TRICARE and other federal health care programs. The law is intended to prevent medical providers from having their judgment compromised by improper financial incentives.
Reuters contributed to this report.