OxyContin manufacturer considering bankruptcy

The company that has made billions selling the prescription painkiller OxyContin said Wednesday that it is considering legal options including bankruptcy, a move that could upend hundreds of lawsuits claiming it had a major role in causing the U.S. opioid drug crisis.

“As the company has stated, it is exploring and preparing for any number of eventualities and options, given the amount of litigation the company currently faces,” Purdue Pharma spokesman Robert Josephson said in an email to The Associated Press. “A decision has not been made to file for bankruptcy, nor is there a timetable.”

Such a move has been seen as a strong possibility as the privately held company hired an executive and consultants that specialize in helping companies restructure in the past year.

The company is owned by members of the Sackler family, who have given money to museums around the world, including the Smithsonian Institution in Washington, New York City’s Metropolitan Museum of Art and London’s Tate Modern. A court filing made public in Massachusetts earlier this year asserts that members of the family were paid more than $4 billion from Purdue from 2007 to 2018.

The first trial date is nearing in hundreds of lawsuits aiming to hold the company and others in the drug industry accountable for the nationwide opioid crisis.