The American supermarket chain Walmart announced on Tuesday that it would pay 3.1 billion dollars in the United States to settle lawsuits brought by states and communities for its role in the opiate crisis in that country.
Like the drugstore chains CVS and Walgreens, which agreed in early November to each pay $5 billion in similar deals, Walmart is accused of mass distribution of opiate painkillers without warning of the high number of prescriptions.
“Pharmacies such as Walmart have played an undeniable role in perpetuating the destruction wrought by opiates,” New York Attorney General Letitia James said in a separate statement.
The overprescription of opiates, which began in the late 1990s, led to a crisis that claimed more than 500,000 lives in 20 years.
Although the trend has reversed since 2016, these drugs have created addictions and caused some patients to turn to drugs like heroin and fentanyl.
Walmart disputes accusations about its role in this crisis and stresses that the agreement does not include any admission of liability. But the group believes that settling the lawsuits is “in the best interest of all parties”.
In addition to the money paid, the company pledged to better monitor prescriptions to prevent fraud and suspicious prescriptions.
This agreement has in any case weighed on the accounts of Walmart, which recorded a net loss of 1.8 billion dollars for the period from August to October.
However, its business held up well and, not taking this exceptional element into account, the supermarket chain posted results that exceeded expectations.
Its turnover notably increased by 8.7% to reach 152.8 billion dollars.
The group now expects its turnover to rise by 5.5% for its accounting year, which ends at the end of January, against 4.5% previously.
It expects its operating profit to fall from 6.5% to 7.5%, which is less than the 9% to 11% decline forecast so far.
Walmart had warned this summer that its margins would be eroded this year by inflation, which weighs on the budget of its customers. The latter therefore spend more on food and gasoline and less on other goods, at generally higher margins.