Deals
Court Approves First Bankruptcy Sale of a Major Opioid Drug
- Sale of Subsys approved after tight controls put on buyer
- Insys was first drugmaker bankrupted by addiction lawsuits
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Insys Therapeutics Inc. won court approval to sell the rights to its highly addictive painkiller, Subsys, after a last-minute deal with state officials that imposes tight restrictions on the future marketing of the fentanyl-based drug.
The restrictions adopted by BTcP Pharma, LLC, the buyer, are designed to ensure the spray is marketed only to cancer specialists, not doctors in general, U.S. Bankruptcy Judge Kevin Gross said in approving the sale. In May, Insys founder and former Chief Executive Officer John Kapoor and four former executives were convicted of bribing doctors to boost off-label prescriptions of Subsys, even though it was originally intended to treat cancer pain.