Dear fellow CII members

Today, the International Brotherhood of Teamsters sent the following letter to McKesson’s board urging it to clawback pay from CEO John Hammergren in light of the growing controversy over the company’s role in fueling the opioid epidemic, which now claims 80 lives a day. A copy of the letter is available online, while coverage from the Washington Post and links to a series of investigative pieces by the newspaper on McKesson and the opioid epidemic are available here.

I encourage you to contact me if you share our concerns or have questions as to the state of play at McKesson.

Dear McKesson Board Member:

            As you are no doubt aware, McKesson is emerging as a central figure in the media’s ever-intensifying coverage of the opioid epidemic, the government’s drug enforcement efforts, and a potentially precedent-setting civil suit by the state of West Virginia.  Charged by West Virginia’s Attorney General with “illegal and reckless and malicious action” in “flooding” a state of fewer than 2 million people with 100 million opiate doses over a five-year period, McKesson has faced a torrent of negative media attention connecting the company to this deadly crisis and raising questions about how sales of highly addictive drugs may have been incentivized.

Despite repeated assurances from CEO John Hammergren, dating as far back as 2008 –the time of the first of two settlements with the Drug Enforcement Agency (DEA) -- that preventing the diversion of controlled substances was a top priority, the available evidence suggests that management either did know or should have known that many of the opioids the company distributed were going to the black market.  Still, over the past five years, CEO Hammergren has received more than $368 million in realizable compensation demonstrating a startling lack of accountability at the top

Please follow the link to read the full letter.

Regards

Carin Zelenko