Actelion Pharmaceuticals, a drug company based in South San Francisco, Calif., reached a $360 million settlement with the the Department of Justice to resolve accusations that it violated the False Claims Act.
The department accused Actelion of violating the Anti-Kickback Statute by illegally using a nonprofit foundation as a conduit to pay copays for thousands of Medicare beneficiaries using the drugmaker's pulmonary arterial hypertension drugs.
Actelion made donations to the foundation from 2014-15, then turned around and used the donations to cover copays for the drugs, according to the Justice Department. As a result, Actelion induced patients to select its drugs, which would have otherwise been unaffordable to many beneficiaries, according to the department.
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