Justice Department sues Walmart for alleged role in opioid crisis

Walmart.
(Image credit: Getty Images)

The Justice Department on Tuesday sued Walmart, claiming lax oversight in its pharmacies helped fuel the opioid epidemic.

In one of the Trump administration's last shots at big-name facilitators of opioid abuse across the U.S., the DOJ alleged Walmart understaffed its pharmacies to cut costs, The Wall Street Journal reports. In turn, overworked pharmacy staffers didn't catch invalid or otherwise problematic opioid prescriptions they shouldn't have filled, the suit alleges.

Subscribe to The Week

Escape your echo chamber. Get the facts behind the news, plus analysis from multiple perspectives.

SUBSCRIBE & SAVE
https://cdn.mos.cms.futurecdn.net/flexiimages/jacafc5zvs1692883516.jpg

Sign up for The Week's Free Newsletters

From our morning news briefing to a weekly Good News Newsletter, get the best of The Week delivered directly to your inbox.

From our morning news briefing to a weekly Good News Newsletter, get the best of The Week delivered directly to your inbox.

Sign up
Explore More
Kathryn Krawczyk

Kathryn is a graduate of Syracuse University, with degrees in magazine journalism and information technology, along with hours to earn another degree after working at SU's independent paper The Daily Orange. She's currently recovering from a horse addiction while living in New York City, and likes to share her extremely dry sense of humor on Twitter.