Christopher Julian’s experience with opioids resonates with countless Americans.
As a teenager, he was given painkillers to manage several sports-related injuries. Julian noted that his physician never warned him about the potential for addiction. It wasn’t until years later, when his access to the medication was abruptly cut off, that he realized the truth about their addictive properties and began to experience withdrawal symptoms. This led him to start obtaining pills from relatives and purchasing them from others within his community in southern Maine.
After his brother’s death from brain cancer in 2011, Julian turned to opioids as a means to cope with his emotional pain in addition to physical suffering.
In his struggle, Julian resorted to theft to fund his addiction, cycling through periods of incarceration and rehabilitation, and he claims to have experienced overdoses ten times, at one point receiving CPR from his mother in their bathroom.
His life was described as “hell on Earth,” but today, at the age of 43, Julian is in long-term recovery.
Like many others who have endured similar hardships, Julian has submitted claims to seek compensation from pharmaceutical companies implicated in the opioid crisis.
This year, he received his first compensation check: a sum of $324.58.
That amount is merely enough to fill his gas tank about eight times or cover roughly a tenth of the rent for the apartment he shares with his fiancée and two children.
In contrast, Cumberland County, where Julian resides, has received over $700,000 in settlement funds related to opioids and anticipates almost $1.6 million more in future years, according to a recently updated KFF Health News database. Across the state, jurisdictions have collectively received more than $68 million, while governments nationwide have secured over $10 billion, as documented in the database.
This disparity in compensation between individuals and governments emphasizes a sense of injustice felt by those directly impacted by the crisis, who argue that their suffering is the very reason why governments reached these settlements.
While settlements with companies such as Purdue Pharma, Walmart, and Johnson & Johnson have resulted in eye-catching multibillion-dollar payouts, the majority of these funds are being directed towards state and local governments rather than the victims themselves.
Only a select few companies that went bankrupt, including Purdue Pharma, Mallinckrodt, Endo, and Rite Aid, have allocated funds for individual payouts. Victims must file claims within a designated timeframe and provide documentation proving their prescriptions from the respective companies. Even then, many individuals can expect to receive only a few thousand dollars; estimates suggest that payouts will not commence for many of these companies for months or even years.
In contrast, state and local governments are already receiving settlement money. To illustrate the scale of these payouts, KFF Health News downloaded data from BrownGreer, the firm overseeing numerous national opioid settlements, to update a searchable database that allows users to check the compensation their city, county, or state has received or anticipates receiving in the coming years.
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Governments have obtained these funds by arguing that their public safety, health, and social service systems were damaged by the opioid epidemic. The expectation is that these settlements will be utilized to fund addiction treatment, recovery, and preventive programs. However, many affected individuals and families assert that governments have not honored this commitment.
“At a minimum, they could allocate these funds to prevent future tragedies,” said Ryan Hampton, a national recovery advocate and former co-chair of a committee in the Purdue Pharma bankruptcy case, where he represented victims. “What we’ve witnessed to date stands in stark contrast to that.”
In Pennsylvania, families grieving the loss of loved ones raised similar issues with Democratic Governor Josh Shapiro, who finalized opioid settlements during his tenure as attorney general.
“Instead of directing funds toward solutions based on evidence, you and your administration have permitted counties to misallocate these resources into law enforcement and ineffective programs that are already funded—we find this disrespectful to both our families and the lives lost,” they expressed in a letter dated February 14. “Meanwhile, grieving families—many of whom have lost everything—are receiving no financial support.”
“Governments were far more powerful”
Indeed, numerous governments have allocated millions of settlement dollars towards treatment programs, recovery resources, and the distribution of overdose reversal medications, among other initiatives. Some officials in charge of these funds contend that such services, which benefit many residents, could potentially achieve a greater impact than individual payments.
Will Simons, a spokesperson for the Pennsylvania governor, stated that the Shapiro administration has invested almost $90 million of settlement funds into treatment, recovery, harm reduction, and prevention initiatives, including programs aimed at youth prevention, a drug and alcohol call center, and loan repayment programs designed to attract and retain workers in the addiction treatment and recovery sectors.
Many of the awarded organizations “support families who have lost loved ones to this crisis, providing emotional counseling and other assistance,” Simons noted.
Several jurisdictions have established relatively modest funds aimed at assisting individuals, such as one in Boston to support families mourning the loss of loved ones to addiction, and a fund in Alabama for grandparents caring for children due to parental substance use.
However, on a national scale, examples of direct cash payments to individuals remain sparse, which many advocates, including Hampton, had initially envisioned.
In the mid-2010s, Hampton and other advocates contemplated filing class action lawsuits against pharmaceutical companies but soon recognized they lacked the necessary resources.
A few years later, as state attorneys general began pursuing cases against those companies, victims were filled with hope, believing they would finally receive compensation alongside their governments. Hampton and other advocates rallied, shared their stories, and garnered support for the state’s lawsuits.
In 2019, upon becoming co-chair of the Official Committee of Unsecured Creditors in the Purdue Pharma bankruptcy and arriving at the negotiating table with state attorneys general and other stakeholders, he felt “everyone was there to take on the big bad pharmaceutical company and prioritize victims’ interests,” he remarked. But as negotiations continued among the various creditors vying for assets, he discovered that “governments wielded significantly more power than victims and believed they had incurred greater harm in terms of costs.”
While the details of the Purdue settlement are still being finalized, payments are expected to commence next year, although estimates indicate that state and local governments will receive the vast majority of funds, while more than 100,000 victims will be left to share a minuscule portion of the bankruptcy payout.
Mallinckrodt, a manufacturer of generic opioids, is currently the only company that has begun distributing compensation to victims as of early 2025, according to Frank Younes, a partner at the Nebraska-based law firm High & Younes, which represents personal injury claimants in various opioid bankruptcies.
After accounting for roughly 25% in administrative fees to the national trust overseeing the bankruptcy and an additional 40% in legal fees, some of his clients have received compensation ranging from $400 to $700, Younes reported.
He further predicts that payouts from two other companies—Endo and Rite Aid—will be “even lower.”
However, many victims will not see any compensation. Some were unaware that they needed to file claims until it was too late, while others faced difficulties in procuring medical records from closed doctors’ offices or pharmacies that no longer maintained older documents.
Out of nearly 20,000 individuals who reached out to Younes’ firm for participation in the various opioid bankruptcies, only about 3,500 successfully filed claims.
“Act for these families”
John McNerney was informed that his claim against Purdue Pharma was disqualified due to not being prescribed a sufficient amount of OxyContin. He filed claims against Mallinckrodt and Endo instead.
McNerney, 60, residing in Boca Raton, Florida, recounted suffering a spinal injury decades ago from a fall during plumbing work. Over the years, he was prescribed multiple painkillers. After his prescriptions were terminated, he turned to pills obtained from a friend on the street. McNerney spent approximately $30,000 on rehabilitation before achieving long-term recovery.
Now, seeing governments allocate settlement funds for police vehicles or library materials on addiction “instead of investing 100% into rehabilitation,” he expressed his frustration, saying, “It truly bothers me.”
“I haven’t received a penny,” he added.
Similarly, in Ohio, families impacted by addiction are disheartened that funding isn’t reaching them or the programs they believe would be most beneficial.
The families have partnered with local nonprofits to submit grant proposals to the OneOhio Recovery Foundation, which manages most of Ohio’s opioid settlement funds. They sought several million dollars for family support initiatives, training resources for families caring for children whose parents struggle with substance use disorders, and emergency financial assistance for families in need of cribs or school supplies, along with covering funeral expenses.
Jackie Lewis, a member of this group, shared that when her 34-year-old son, Shaun, died from an overdose, she had to rely on credit cards to pay for his funeral. Although she has filed a claim in the opioid bankruptcies, she hasn’t received any funds yet.
“Numerous families lack credit cards to manage these expenses,” Lewis noted. “I’ve spoken to families that couldn’t even afford flowers. Some had to opt for cremation instead of a traditional funeral.”
The first round of grants from the OneOhio Recovery Foundation did not allocate any funding to her group.
Connie Luck, a spokesperson for the foundation, clarified that the legal framework establishing the foundation prohibits direct payments to individuals impacted by the crisis. The foundation has allocated over $45 million to support 245 projects statewide, including many that offer family assistance services such as childcare and housing support.
“We harbor deep empathy for those who have lost loved ones to the opioid crisis—their suffering is palpable, and it propels the Foundation’s mission to combat this epidemic and avert future occurrences,” Luck stated.
In Maine, Julian has come to terms with his $325 payout, choosing to view it as an unexpected bonus rather than restitution for his extensive suffering.
He aspires for governments to utilize their larger settlements to provide genuine support—such as food and rental assistance for those in recovery and increasing treatment capacity to ensure no one has to endure a six-month wait for rehab, as he once did.
“They’re receiving millions of dollars,” Julian remarked, reflecting on the many friends he has lost to overdose. “They could indeed offer meaningful aid to families who have experienced tremendous losses.”
KFF Health News data editor Holly K. Hacker contributed to this article.
METHODOLOGY
For over two years, KFF Health News has been monitoring how state and local governments utilize—and sometimes misappropriate—billions of dollars in opioid settlement funds. This database represents the third update of data indicating how much revenue state and local governments have accrued through national settlements with entities responsible for producing or distributing prescription painkillers.
BrownGreer, the court-appointed organization administering numerous national opioid settlements, tracks the funds distributed to various state and local governments, along with anticipated allocations for future years. Initially, this information was kept under wraps.
In 2023, KFF Health News negotiated access to this data, making it publicly available for the first time. Five months later, BrownGreer began sharing updated versions of this information on a public website.
Last year, KFF Health News collected data from BrownGreer’s records on payouts from pharmaceutical distributors AmerisourceBergen (now Cencora), Cardinal Health, and McKesson, as well as opioid manufacturer Janssen (currently known as Johnson & Johnson Innovative Medicine), and created a searchable database using state-by-state spreadsheets with unique entries for each settling company.
This year, KFF Health News has further updated that database with new information from BrownGreer, which includes payouts from opioid manufacturers Allergan and Teva, in addition to CVS, Walgreens, and Walmart pharmacies.
KFF Health News acquired data from BrownGreer’s website between January 20 and 24, 2025, regarding payouts from all companies. Users can navigate the database to review the total dollar amounts received or expected by their respective cities, counties, or states annually.
While this represents the most comprehensive data available nationwide, it only offers a snapshot of all opioid settlement payouts. Additional settlements, including those involving OxyContin manufacturer Purdue Pharma, remain pending. This information does not incorporate other agreements that some state and local governments have executed beyond the national settlements, such as the accord involving Illinois, Indiana, Kentucky, Michigan, and Ohio with the regional supermarket chain Meijer. Consequently, this database may underestimate the total opioid settlement funds received and projected for many areas.
Additionally, payment details for certain states are unavailable due to various factors: they may not have participated in national settlements, had unique settlement agreements, or opted for payment distribution independent of BrownGreer. Some examples include:
· West Virginia chose not to join several national settlements, opting instead for individual agreements with multiple companies.
· Texas and Nevada received full payments from Janssen outside of national settlements, meaning their payout data is limited to funds from other entities involved in the national settlements.
· Florida, Louisiana, and Pennsylvania, among others, opted for lump-sum payments through BrownGreer, overseeing the redistribution of funds to local jurisdictions.
A few states have already begun receiving anticipated payments for 2027 from distributors (AmerisourceBergen—now Cencora—Cardinal Health, and McKesson) early in 2024. However, in states like Colorado, Michigan, and Washington, BrownGreer does not disclose how these prepayments are allocated among localities, potentially leading to underreported locality payments for 2024 and overreported ones for 2027.
For Oregon, BrownGreer indicates that 2024 payments from Walmart have been fully accounted for in statewide data, yet lists some local payments as “projected.” Since this data was collected after the projected date, those amounts have been included in the 2024 totals for Oregon localities. No other states displayed this discrepancy.
KFF Health News is a national newsroom dedicated to producing in-depth journalism on health issues, functioning as one of the core operating programs at KFF—the independent source for health policy research, polling, and journalism.
