District Court Upholds 12-Year Bans From Federal Programs for Drug Executives

A federal district court Dec. 13 said the government’s imposition of a 12-year exclusion from federal health care programs for three former senior executives of a drug company was reasonable (Friedman v. Sebelius).

The case involves former executives of Purdue Frederick Co. and their program exclusion for failing to stop the company’s misbranding of its painkiller drug OxyContin. Judge Ellen Segal Huvelle of the U.S. District Court for the District of Columbia upheld the decision by Kathleen Sebelius, the secretary of the Department of Health and Human Services, that excluded Michael Friedman, Paul Goldenheim, and Howard Udell from ...