Drug wholesale distributor AmerisourceBergen said on Thursday it had received a grand jury subpoena from federal prosecutors in Florida seeking documents related to opioid products and its communications with a drugmaker.
AmerisourceBergen said in a filing with the U.S. Securities and Exchange Commission that it received the subpoena in May. The company is among several drug manufacturers and distributors facing lawsuits over their roles in the U.S. opioid epidemic.
The company did not identify the pharmaceutical manufacturer cited in the subpoena. AmerisourceBergen said it is in the process of responding to it.
The Chesterbrook, Pennsylvania-based company did not immediately respond to a request for comment.
Opioids were involved in more than 42,000 overdose deaths in 2016, according to the U.S. Centers for Disease Control and Prevention.
Hundreds of lawsuits by states, counties and cities have accused drugmakers of pushing addictive painkillers through deceptive marketing and allege that wholesale distributors failed to report suspicious drug orders.
AmerisourceBergen, which is among the defendants, is one of the largest drug distributors in the country. AmerisourceBergen and rivals Cardinal Health and McKesson control 85 percent of the U.S. prescription drug market.
The subpoena came from the U.S. Attorneys Office for the Southern District of Florida.
That office previously in January sent grand jury subpoenas to pharmaceutical manufacturers Endo International and Mallinckrodt regarding products they produce that contain the opioid painkiller oxymorphone, both companies have said.
Endo and Mallinckrodt did not immediately respond to a request for comment.
AmerisourceBergen has previously disclosed receiving subpoenas dating back to 2012 from federal prosecutors in other states regarding its program for controlling and monitoring the diversion of controlled substances into improper channels.
