Attorney General Andy Beshear is urging Kentuckians who purchased Provigil to file their claims as part of the more than $1 million settlement his office secured with pharmaceutical company Cephalon last year over its anticompetitive conduct to protect profits from its sleep disorder drug.
As part of the settlement, Kentuckians who used the drug will receive a portion of roughly $760,000. Kentucky’s Medicaid program will receive nearly $500,000 as part of the settlement.
To date, 525 Kentuckians have filed claims. The deadline to file a claim is June 25, Beshear said.
“As attorney general, I am committed to pursuing anyone who defrauds consumers and our government, and my office will continue to monitor the settlement and work with Kentuckians who may need assistance on filing their claims,” Beshear said. “My office asked the court for additional time so that more Kentuckians could receive restitution, and that deadline is just a few weeks away.”
Kentuckians eligible to file claims are those who paid for the brand-name drug Provigil or its generic Modafinil from June 24, 2006, to March 31, 2012.
Beshear and a group of attorneys general were recently granted a request by the courts to extend the time to file claims on the settlement to June 25, 2017. The deadline was originally the middle of April.
Kentuckians may obtain a claim form by visiting http://www.StateAGProvigilSettlement.com or by calling 877-236-1413.
The settlement ends a multistate investigation into Cephalon, headquartered in Pennsylvania. Cephalon is a wholly owned subsidiary of Teva Pharmaceuticals.
According to the settlement, the company’s anticompetitive actions delayed generic versions of Provigil, used to treat excessive sleepiness caused by sleep apnea, narcolepsy or shift work sleep disorder from entering the market for several years.
As patent and regulatory barriers that prevented generic competition to Provigil neared expiration, the company intentionally defrauded the federal government to secure an additional patent.
To date, Beshear’s office has returned over $19 million to the state and federal Medicaid programs, and has recently returned more than $7 million to the state’s General Fund from civil settlements with Mortgage Electronic Registration Systems Inc. (MERS), Volkswagen, Hyundai-Kia, Bristol-Myers Squibb, Western Union and Johnson & Johnson Consumer Inc.
(story provided by Office of the Attorney General)
