Merck agrees to pay$650M+ to settle suits

Merck has agreed to pay more than $650 million to settle two whistleblower suits, the U.S. Justice Department has announced. One of the suits claimed that the pharma paid providers to use its products, disguising kickbacks as compensation for training, consulting and market research. The other suit claimed that Merck gave hospitals volume discounts on Zocor, Vioxx and Pepcid while failing to offer Medicaid the same discounts. (Nevada, for example, concluded that Merck was charging hospitals less than 8 percent of its reported price on Zocor, while failing to give the state's Medicaid program the same price.) Former Merck sales manager H. Dean Steinke will get about $68.2 million for his role in the suits, while the other whistleblower, New Orleans physician William LaCorte, will receive $24.1 million.

To learn more about the suit:
- read this Modern Healthcare article [1] (reg. req.)

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Merck posts $1.6 billion loss. Report [3]
Merck settling Vioxx claims for $4.85B. Report [4]