Company behind the EpiPen is caught up in another drug price scandal

Mylan is facing problems beyond the EpiPen.
Mylan is facing problems beyond the EpiPen.
Image: drew angerer/Getty Images

You'd think one scandal would be enough. 

Mylan, the company that came under fire this summer for systematically raising the price of the EpiPen, is caught up in another drug price scheme. 

The pharmaceutical player is one of six companies accused of inflating prices of a diabetes drug and an antibiotic, according to the New York Times. The complaint centers on generic, rather than brand-name, drugs. 

A civil complaint filed by 20 states claims that the drug companies coordinated a price-fixing scheme through personal phone calls and texts as well as "informal industry gatherings," the Times said. 

The complaint also names Teva Pharmaceuticals and the smaller companies Aurobindo, Citron, Heritage and Mayne. Teva is the world's largest manufacturer of generic medicines, the Times noted. 

This price fixing accusation revolves around anti-competitive coordination between companies, as opposed to the EpiPen outrage which involved only Mylan. In that case, the company steadily and steeply raised the price of the life-saving anti-allergy tool over the course of nearly a decade. 

Mylan owned the rights to the brand-name product, and only introduced a generic option this week after months of outrage. 

A Mylan spokeswoman told the Times that the company knew of “no evidence that Mylan participated in price-fixing.”

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