Pharmaceutical company QOL Medical and its CEO, Frederick Cooper, have agreed to pay $47 million to settle allegations that they violated the False Claims Act by offering kickbacks to healthcare providers to induce prescriptions for their drug Sucraid.
Here are three things to know:
- The settlement resolves claims from 2018 to 2022. QOL provided free Carbon-13 breath tests to doctors, falsely promoting them as a diagnostic tool for Congenital Sucrase-Isomaltase Deficiency, a rare genetic condition, according to a Nov. 15 Justice Department news release.
- The breath tests did not diagnose CSID. QOL tracked positive test results and encouraged its sales force to target healthcare providers whose patients tested positive, pushing them to prescribe Sucraid, a high-cost drug, the release said.
- Under the settlement, QOL and Cooper accepted responsibility for their actions, agreeing to pay $43.6 million for federal healthcare programs and $3.4 million for state Medicaid programs. Former employees, who filed the whistleblower lawsuit, will receive approximately $8 million as their share of the recovery.