Walmart Sues US In Pre-emptive Strike In Opioid Abuse Battle

But on Thursday, Walmart filed a lawsuit saying that the Justice Department and the Drug Enforcement Administration are blaming the company for the government’s own lack of regulatory and enforcement policies to stem the opioid crisis.

Walmart and its pharmacists find themselves in an untenable position, Walmart said in the lawsuit filed in the U.S. District Court in the Eastern District of Texas. Under defendants sweeping view, Walmart and its pharmacists may be held liable perhaps even criminally for failing to second-guess DEA-registered doctors and refuse their prescriptions. But if pharmacists do so, they may face the wrath of state medical boards, the medical community at large, individual doctors, and patients.