Brooklyn court fines drug company $260 million for selling misbranded cancer drugs
One of the nation’s largest wholesale drug companies pled guilty in Brooklyn’s Federal Court Wednesday morning to illegally distributing misbranded drugs and for failing to register with the Food and Drug Administration. It agreed to pay a fine of $260 million.
AmerisourceBergen Specialty Group (ABSG) pled guilty to the charges in front of U.S. District Court Judge Nina Gershon.
According to court documents, two of ABSG’s Alabama-based subsidiaries, Medical Initiatives Inc. and Oncology Supply Company, prepared syringes with pre-filled and mislabeled oncology supportive care drugs. The syringes were then shipped all over the country to oncology centers to cancer patients undergoing chemotherapy. Thirty-seven of those centers are located in the Eastern District of New York, which includes Brooklyn, Queens and Long Island.