美国国家公共电台 NPR 'This Case Will Set A Precedent': First Major Opioid Trial Opens In Oklahoma

 

MARY LOUISE KELLY, HOST:

Drug companies are facing lawsuits² over their role in the nationwide opioid crisis. And tomorrow in Oklahoma, the first trial gets underway. The state is suing industry giant Johnson & Johnson over its marketing³ of opioids. Jackie Fortier of StateImpact Oklahoma reports.

JACKIE FORTIER, BYLINE⁴: Greg lives in Guthrie, Okla., about an hour north of the courthouse where Johnson & Johnson is headed to trial. The state is trying to win money to pay for treatment for people like Greg. He worries he'll lose his job if we use his last name.

GREG: The first time I ever did use them, I had my wisdom teeth taken out. And they gave me a script for them, and I ended up taking, like, most of them at once and just kind of toughing out the pain. I enjoyed it. It felt good.

FORTIER: He says he's been addicted⁵ to opioids for 11 years. People with prescriptions⁷ sell him their pills. Sometimes, Greg binges and takes 400 milligrams of morphine at once - a huge dose. Even with health insurance, his wife, Judy, says they can't find integrated treatment for both his addiction⁸ and his bipolar disorder⁹. It's either one or the other.

JUDY: They don't give you, like, a treatment plan for both, right?

GREG: No.

JUDY: So they just say, oh, well, here, you can talk to this person.

GREG: Right, yeah.

JUDY: I mean, they don't recognize like - it's, like, self-medicating.

FORTIER: Judy is afraid if he doesn't get the treatment he needs, he may overdose. Federal health officials found that prescription⁶ in street opioids were involved in more than 47,000 overdose deaths in 2017. Nora Freeman Engstrom is a professor at Stanford Law School.

NORA FREEMAN ENGSTROM: It's the equivalent roughly of two 747 aircraft crashing every week.

FORTIER: A majority of states and more than 1,600 local and tribal¹⁰ governments are suing drugmakers and distributors. They're trying to recoup billions of dollars spent on addressing the fallout tied to opioid addiction. Engstrom says the Oklahoma case will be the first in this wave of litigation.

ENGSTROM: So we'll all be seeing what evidence is available, what evidence isn't available and just how convincing that evidence is.

FORTIER: Oklahoma filed this lawsuit¹ in 2017 against drug giants Purdue Pharma, Johnson & Johnson and generic¹¹ drug-maker Teva Pharmaceuticals¹². In March, Purdue Pharma, without accepting blame, settled with the state for $270 million. Soon after, state attorney general Mike Hunter dropped all but one of the civil claims, including fraud, against the remaining defendants¹³.

MIKE HUNTER: We have looked at literally¹⁴ millions of documents. We've taken hundreds of depositions¹⁵.

FORTIER: And with just two days to go before a very public televised trial, Teva Pharmaceuticals announced an $85 million settlement with the state. Teva said it has not contributed to the abuse of opioids in Oklahoma in any way. That leaves Johnson & Johnson as the only opioid manufacturer headed to trial in Oklahoma. And the entire case rests on a claim of public nuisance.

RICHARD AUSNESS: It's sexy, you know? Public nuisance makes it sound like the defendants are really bad.

FORTIER: Richard Ausness is a law professor at the University of Kentucky. He says the Oklahoma attorney general's decision to not join with a larger consolidated¹⁶ case could mean a quicker resolution for the state or no money at all.

AUSNESS: And particularly when we're talking about AGs who are politicians who want to be able to tell the people, gee¹⁷, this is what I've done for you, they're not interested in waiting two or three years. They want it now. So, of course, the risk of that is you may lose.

FORTIER: If Oklahoma loses, the state may foot a decades-long and multimillion-dollar bill for addiction treatment. And a defeat could signal to others that pursuing opioid manufacturers in court comes with a financial risk. For NPR News, I'm Jackie Fortier in Norman, Okla.

1 lawsuit   

n.诉讼，控诉

参考例句：

• They threatened him with a lawsuit.他们以诉讼威逼他。
• He was perpetually involving himself in this long lawsuit.他使自己无休止地卷入这场长时间的诉讼。

2 lawsuits   

n.诉讼( lawsuit的名词复数 )

参考例句：

• Lawsuits involving property rights and farming and grazing rights increased markedly. 涉及财产权，耕作与放牧权的诉讼案件显著地增加。 来自辞典例句
• I've lost and won more lawsuits than any man in England. 全英国的人算我官司打得最多，赢的也多，输的也多。 来自辞典例句

3 marketing   

n.行销，在市场的买卖，买东西

参考例句：

• They are developing marketing network.他们正在发展销售网络。
• He often goes marketing.他经常去市场做生意。

4 byline   

n.署名；v.署名

参考例句：

• His byline was absent as well.他的署名也不见了。
• We wish to thank the author of this article which carries no byline.我们要感谢这篇文章的那位没有署名的作者。

5 addicted   

adj.沉溺于....的，对...上瘾的

参考例句：

• He was addicted to heroin at the age of 17.他17岁的时候对海洛因上了瘾。
• She's become addicted to love stories.她迷上了爱情小说。

6 prescription   

n.处方，开药；指示，规定

参考例句：

• The physician made a prescription against sea- sickness for him.医生给他开了个治晕船的药方。
• The drug is available on prescription only.这种药只能凭处方购买。

7 prescriptions   

药( prescription的名词复数 )； 处方； 开处方； 计划

参考例句：

• The hospital of traditional Chinese medicine installed a computer to fill prescriptions. 中医医院装上了电子计算机来抓药。
• Her main job was filling the doctor's prescriptions. 她的主要工作就是给大夫开的药方配药。

8 addiction   

n.上瘾入迷，嗜好

参考例句：

• He stole money from his parents to feed his addiction.他从父母那儿偷钱以满足自己的嗜好。
• Areas of drug dealing are hellholes of addiction,poverty and murder.贩卖毒品的地区往往是吸毒上瘾、贫困和发生谋杀的地方。

9 disorder   

n.紊乱，混乱；骚动，骚乱；疾病，失调

参考例句：

• When returning back,he discovered the room to be in disorder.回家后，他发现屋子里乱七八糟。
• It contained a vast number of letters in great disorder.里面七零八落地装着许多信件。

10 tribal   

adj.部族的，种族的

参考例句：

• He became skilled in several tribal lingoes.他精通几种部族的语言。
• The country was torn apart by fierce tribal hostilities.那个国家被部落间的激烈冲突弄得四分五裂。

11 generic   

adj.一般的，普通的，共有的

参考例句：

• I usually buy generic clothes instead of name brands.我通常买普通的衣服，不买名牌。
• The generic woman appears to have an extraordinary faculty for swallowing the individual.一般妇女在婚后似乎有特别突出的抑制个性的能力。

12 pharmaceuticals   

n.医药品；药物( pharmaceutical的名词复数 )

参考例句：

• the development of new pharmaceuticals 新药的开发
• The companies are pouring trillions of yen into biotechnology research,especially for pharmaceuticals and new seeds. 这些公司将大量资金投入生物工艺学研究，尤其是药品和新种子方面。 来自《简明英汉词典》

13 defendants   

被告( defendant的名词复数 )

参考例句：

• The courts heard that the six defendants had been coerced into making a confession. 法官审判时发现6位被告人曾被迫承认罪行。
• As in courts, the defendants are represented by legal counsel. 与法院相同，被告有辩护律师作为代表。 来自英汉非文学 - 政府文件

14 literally   

adv.照字面意义，逐字地；确实

参考例句：

• He translated the passage literally.他逐字逐句地翻译这段文字。
• Sometimes she would not sit down till she was literally faint.有时候，她不走到真正要昏厥了，决不肯坐下来。

15 depositions   

沉积（物）( deposition的名词复数 )； （在法庭上的）宣誓作证； 处置； 罢免

参考例句：

• The safety problems are more severe for low-pressure depositions because the processes often use concentrated gases. 对于低压淀积来说安全性问题更为突出，因为这种工艺通常使用高浓度的气体。
• The chief method is to take depositions of parties and witnesses. 主要的方法是录取当事人和证人的宣誓证言。 来自口语例句

16 consolidated   

a.联合的

参考例句：

• With this new movie he has consolidated his position as the country's leading director. 他新执导的影片巩固了他作为全国最佳导演的地位。
• Those two banks have consolidated and formed a single large bank. 那两家银行已合并成一家大银行。

17 gee   

n.马；int.向右！前进！，惊讶时所发声音；v.向右转

参考例句：

• Their success last week will gee the team up.上星期的胜利将激励这支队伍继续前进。
• Gee,We're going to make a lot of money.哇！我们会赚好多钱啦！