A subsidiary of Valeant Pharmaceuticals has agreed to pay $54 million to settle allegations it paid kickbacks to doctors for prescribing its drugs.
The settlement comes in response to whistle-blower lawsuits that alleged North Carolina-based Salix Pharmaceuticals violated the Anti-Kickback Statute and False Claims Act. The company, which sells products to treat gastroenterology conditions, allegedly paid doctors to educate other doctors at speaker programs between 2009 and 2013. But the doctors spent very little or no time discussing the products at the events, which were often held at high-end restaurants, according to the U.S. attorney in New York City.
An attempt to reach Salix for comment Thursday afternoon was not immediately successful. Valeant bought Salix in 2015.
As part of the settlement agreement with the government, Salix acknowledged that some of its employees held speaker programs that were social in nature and did not comply with the company's internal policies. Salix acknowledged that in some programs, the designated speaker didn't actually discuss the covered product and sometimes the required slide presentation wasn't shown.
According to the settlement agreement, doctors were paid between $250 to $4,500 per event, and Salix paid more than 500 physicians between 2009 and 2013, with some earning more than $100,000 each.
During that time frame, Salix spent about $25 million on speaker payments and meals, according to the U.S. attorney's office.
In successful False Claims Act cases, whistle-blowers are entitled to a share of whatever money the government recovers. In this case the whistle-blowers listed on the settlement agreement included Dr. Steven Peikin and former Salix employees Seana Swierczek, Christine Moore, Paul Mastrella and Rasvinder Dhaliwal. The settlement agreement did not list how much money they'll receive and the U.S. attorney's office was not able to immediately provide the figure.
