Drugmakers pressed for opioid financial information, studies

WASHINGTON — A Democratic senator is seeking marketing information, sales records and studies from manufacturers of the top-selling opioid products in the United States to determine whether drugmakers have contributed to an overuse of the pain killers.

[...] President Trump convened an emotional roundtable Wednesday attended by New Jersey Gov. Chris Christie, members of his Cabinet, law enforcement chiefs and recovering addicts.

Some of the records she is asking for from the five companies include the sales rep expenses for entertaining physicians, payments made to health care advocacy groups, as well as marketing and business plans.

In September, the Associated Press and Center for Public Integrity published an investigation outlining how makers of prescription painkillers have adopted a 50-state strategy that includes hundreds of lobbyists and millions in campaign contributions to help kill or weaken measures aimed at stemming the tide of prescription opioids.

The industry and its allies spent more than $880 million nationwide on lobbying and campaign contributions from 2006 through 2015 — more than 200 times what those advocating for stricter policies spent and eight times more than the influential gun lobby recorded for similar activities during that same period, the investigation found.

The Republican chairman, Sen. Ron Johnson of Wisconsin, did not sign the letter seeking the information from the drug manufacturers, and an aide said Republicans weren’t given time to join the investigation.