LITTLE ROCK – Arkansas Attorney General Leslie Rutledge today announced a lawsuit against drug manufacturers and Pharmacy Benefit Managers (PBMs) for manipulating and inflating insulin and drug prices in Arkansas. In the complaint, filed in Pulaski County, Attorney General Rutledge alleges that Novo Nordisk, Sanofi and Eli Lilly conspired with Express Scripts, Caremark and Optum to significantly increase their revenues by unfairly and deceptively driving up the costs of insulin, making insulin and other diabetic treatments unaffordable for many diabetics in Arkansas and creating an enormous financial burden for Arkansas consumers.
“Thousands of Arkansans rely on insulin every day to live their best life. These drug manufacturers and PBMs have inflated the price of insulin and other diabetes-related medication to line their own pockets,” said Attorney General Leslie Rutledge. “They have endangered the lives of thousands of Arkansans and Americans, who simply cannot afford to buy this life-saving medicine. Today we begin the fight to stop this outrageous inflation of insulin pricing.”
Diabetes is an epidemic in Arkansas. More than 400,000 people in Arkansas have been diagnosed with diabetes and more than 800,000 are pre-diabetic. Diabetes is the leading cause of blindness, kidney failure, and lower limb amputations. In Arkansas, it’s the seventh-leading cause of death despite the availability of effective treatment. Many Arkansans rely on daily insulin treatments to survive. Millions more use oral medications, insulin, or a combination to control their diabetes. The inflated costs have made it more difficult for Arkansas diabetic patients to buy their medications, leading to avoidable complications and higher overall healthcare costs.
Insulin has been around since the 1920s, but the first synthetic insulin was produced commercially in the 1980s, where it was originally priced at $14. Now it ranges between $300 and $700. While insulin costs hundreds of dollars to buy at the pharmacy, it costs less than $2 to produce. In the last decade alone, manufacturers and PBMs have worked together in an insulin-pricing scheme to increase the price of insulin up to a thousand percent. According to AG Rutledge’s complaint, CVS Caremark, Express Scripts, and OptumRx have collectively dominated the pricing system for insulin and boosted their cash flow during the pricing surge while harming every Arkansan who purchased this life-saving drug.
Attorney General Rutledge is suing the insulin and drug manufacturers and PBMs who created the insulin-pricing scheme for violations of the Arkansas Deceptive Trade Practices Act (ADTPA), unjust enrichment, and civil conspiracy. The lawsuit is seeking injunctive relief, restitution, damages, and civil penalties to address and stop the harm caused by their Insulin-Pricing Scheme.
About Attorney General Leslie Rutledge
Leslie Carol Rutledge is the 56th Attorney General of Arkansas. Elected on November 4, 2014, and sworn in on January 13, 2015, she is the first woman and first Republican in Arkansas history to be elected as Attorney General. She was resoundingly re-elected on November 6, 2018. Since taking office, she has significantly increased the number of arrests and convictions against online predators who exploit children and con artists who steal taxpayer money through Social Security Disability and Medicaid fraud. Further, she has held Rutledge Roundtable meetings and Mobile Office hours in every county of the State each year, and launched a Military and Veterans Initiative. She has led efforts to roll back government regulations that hurt job creators, fight the opioid epidemic, teach internet safety, combat domestic violence and make the office the top law firm for Arkansans. Rutledge serves on committees for Consumer Protection, Criminal Law and Veterans Affairs for the National Association of Attorneys General. She also served as the former Chairwoman of the Republican Attorneys General Association.
A native of Batesville, she is a graduate of the University of Arkansas at Fayetteville and the University of Arkansas at Little Rock William H. Bowen School of Law. Rutledge clerked for the Arkansas Court of Appeals, was Deputy Counsel for former Governor Mike Huckabee, served as a Deputy Prosecuting Attorney in Lonoke County and was an Attorney at the Department of Human Services before serving as Counsel at the Republican National Committee. Rutledge and her husband, Boyce, have one daughter. The family has a home in Pulaski County and a farm in Crittenden County.