Minnesota joins price fixing lawsuit against generic manufacturers

ST. PAUL (LEARFIELD) – Minnesota is joining a lawsuit against manufacturers of generic prescription drugs.

The suit alleges that 20 corporate defendants and 15 individuals conspired to illegally fix prices and allocate markets for 112 prescription generic drugs.

“When you have the greedy, corporate drug cartel that building a business model that is stealing from the sick, dying and the disabled, that is quite frankly maddening,” said  Rep. Rod Hamilton (R-Mountain Lake). Hamilton knows first-hand about the issue, because he lives with multiple sclerosis.

42 other states and Puerto Rico are also part of the lawsuit against the manufacturers.

“According to one report, between mid-2013 and 2014, the prices of more than 1200 generic medications increased an average of over 400 percent,” said Minnesota Attorney General Keith Ellison. “These increases are not normal, they’re no t the way the market’s supposed to work.”