King’s College London has received over £1.5 million from a Sackler family-owned pharmaceutical company to research opioid overdose reversal drugs.
So what? The Sacklers are being held responsible for an opioid epidemic that has killed more than 500,000 Americans since 1999 and which was jet-fuelled by their family-firm, Purdue Pharma, aggressively marketing its addictive opioid-based painkiller OxyContin.
In other words, the company which did so much to create the opioid epidemic is now funding research to develop commercial antidotes to overdoses potentially caused by its own products.
Pharm-anthropy. For decades, the Sacklers have pumped hundreds of millions of their $13 billion fortune built on the back of OxyContin into prominent education, arts and scientific bodies – largely through charities such as The Sackler Trust and The Dr Mortimer and Theresa Sackler Foundation.
But as public anger and US lawsuits mounted against Purdue (and ultimately the Sacklers themselves) over their role in the opioid crisis, cultural institutions on both sides of the Atlantic – including King’s College London (KCL) – tried to wipe themselves clean of the Sackler name.
- Between 2019 and 2022, KCL received £2 million in donations from the Sackler Foundation.
- In May 2023, the university said it had “mutually agreed” with the Sacklers that the neurodevelopment research it supported would “no longer carry the Sackler name”.
But donations were not the only way Sackler cash has made its way into King’s coffers.
Poison and the cure. Mundipharma, a UK-based pharmaceutical company controlled by and held for the benefit of the Sackler family, has been funding research into naloxone – a drug which reverses the effects of an opioid overdose – through KCL’s Department of Addictions Sciences.
Tortoise found that…
- In 2016, KCL researchers were paid by Mundipharma to help develop its concentrated nasal naloxone spray, Nyxoid.
- In 2019, Mundipharma paid KCL £1,581,030 towards a five-year study (running until September 2024) on the “effectiveness of naloxone administration by community members”.
- Although Mundipharma is cited as a “competing interest” in the studies it funded, there is no mention or acknowledgement of its Sackler ownership and posts about naloxone on KCL’s website describe it only as an “international company”.
In response, KCL said it had “cut ties publicly with Dr Mortimer and Theresa Sackler Foundation” in 2023 and that “subsequently no new studies with Mundipharma will take place” – the first time the university has acknowledged the link between the Sacklers and Mundipharma.
When asked whether Mundipharma (and therefore the Sacklers) profited from selling Nyxoid, a spokesperson for the company said it was “committed” to offering Nyxoid “at cost price in countries where it serves as the distributor, without generating any profits”.
And yet… There is money to be made from naloxone. It’s a market expected to double in value to $2.4 billion by 2032 – largely because of increases in opioid abuse. Emergent BioSolutions (not-Sackler owned) made $1.4 billion in US sales of its nasal-spray naloxone, Narcan, between 2019 and 2023.
Last week, the UK government announced it was working on an early warning system to help get ahead of a US-style synthetic-opioid crisis – including an expansion of naloxone distribution.
Nasal spray formulations are particularly sought-after as they are easier to use in an emergency than injectable naloxone, which requires training. They are, however, more expensive: a two-dose pack of Nyxoid costs £26, while Narcan starts at $22 (£17).
Purdue playbook. Mundipharma does profit from selling opioid-based painkillers, including OxyContin, to the international market and it has been accused in Italy, China and Australia of using the same tactics Purdue Pharma used in the US to boost sales.
Mundi-matters. The US Supreme Court is currently deliberating on a bankruptcy deal which would shield the Sackler family from additional opioid-related lawsuits in exchange for a $6 billion settlement to compensate those affected by the opioid epidemic. The Sacklers have proposed at least $1.5 billion of that comes from eventually selling Mundipharma.
The Sackler legacy. Drug overdose is now the leading cause of accidental death in the US, where the Centers for Disease Control estimates there are 91 opioid overdose deaths every day. In the Biden / Trump rematch both sides are seeking to weaponise the opioid epidemic – particularly the rise in fentanyl, a synthetic opioid, being trafficked over the border from Mexico.
For example… behind Biden’s left shoulder during his recent State of the Union address was Republican House Speaker Mike Johnson. Among Johnson’s guests was Texan Stephanie Turner, whose 19-year-old son was killed by a fake Xanax pill laced with fentanyl.
Key Eurozone indicator turns positive
An important indicator of the health of the EU – the Italian bond spread – is moving in a positive direction. The spread measures the difference in lending risk between Italy and Germany. Germany – investors’ teacher’s pet – has historically been low-risk while Italy – firing rubber bands from the back of class – has been highly indebted and high-risk. The ascent of the populist Brothers of Italy widened the spread to 2.5 per cent in October 2022 amid fears of political instability leading to fiscal incontinence. By last Thursday it had halved to 1.16 per cent. Rather than seeing a fundamental change in Italian prospects, though, bond traders are worried about Germany. Investors have seen Germany stumble through energy crises, bitter infighting over aid to Ukraine and anaemic industrial output. The German outlook holds yet more uncertainty, not least because of hard-left tendencies weakening the ruling SDP-led coalition, with the result that Italian bonds look good to investors by comparison. They also offer higher yields.
