US trial opens against companies accused of stoking opioid crisis

West Virginia lawsuit accuses drug distributors of fuelling opioid epidemic with excessive shipments of painkillers.

Drug companies accused of fomenting opioid addiction in the United States are facing millions of dollars in damages in a trial that opened on Monday in the state of West Virginia, which has been hit hard by the epidemic of addiction and overdoses. The city of Huntington filed a federal lawsuit against three big drug distributors -AmerisourceBergen Drug Co, Cardinal Health Inc and McKesson Corp – alleging they pumped addictive painkillers into the state. “It is fitting that the trial will proceed in West Virginia, which has been ground zero of the opioid epidemic,” the plaintiff’s lawyers, Paul Farrell and Anne McGinness Kearse, said in a statement.