OXYCONTIN MAKER WINS ROUND IN COURT

Judge Rejects KY. Plaintiffs' Challenge To Marketing

A federal judge in Kentucky has refused to limit marketing of the
controversial and much-abused prescription painkiller OxyContin.

U.S. District Judge Jennifer B. Coffman ruled last week that a group of
Kentuckians suing the maker of the drug, Purdue Pharma L.P. of Stamford,
Conn., did not prove the need for a preliminary injunction barring
promotional practices by the company.

``The plaintiffs have failed to produce any evidence showing that the
defendants' marketing, promotional, or distribution practices have ever
caused even one tablet of OxyContin to be inappropriately prescribed or
diverted'' for illegal use, Coffman said in her Dec. 27 order.

The ruling came in the first lawsuit filed in Kentucky over OxyContin.
There are at least a dozen similar suits pending in Kentucky and several
other states.

The ruling does not end the lawsuit, in which five living plaintiffs -- and
the estates of two it claims died of OxyContin overdoses -- allege that
aggressive, deceptive marketing and overprescription of the drug led to
serious problems with addiction, crime and overdose deaths in southeastern
Kentucky. They are seeking unspecified damages.

The plaintiffs asked Coffman to issue an injunction that would force Purdue
Pharma to make changes in an Internet site it uses to promote OxyContin.
For instance, the Web site had information related to an advertisement for
OxyContin that the U.S. Food and Drug Administration ordered the company to
stop using in a medical journal, the motion said. The injunction also would
have barred the company from giving doctors or pharmacies more than one
month's supply of OxyContin per prescription, and from giving the drug to
anyone who had not signed a patient-doctor contract. The suit seeks to
develop such a contract as a way to make sure people know the risks of the
drug.

Purdue Pharma opposed the request for the injunction.

The company has argued that its marketing has been legal and responsible.
Improper, illegal diversion is to blame for problems with abuse of the drug
in Kentucky and elsewhere, the company has said.

Coffman said the plaintiffs had failed to show they would be harmed or
misled if Purdue Pharma continued the practices they were seeking to stop.

Peter Perlman of Lexington, one of the attorneys for the people suing
Purdue Pharma, said they felt they had a duty to seek an injunction aimed
at curbing improper marketing while the suit was pending. Coffman's ruling
does not address the merits of the claims in the lawsuit, he said. It was
filed in June.

OxyContin has been a boon to some chronic pain sufferers, but the powerful
painkiller also became one of the most abused drugs in Eastern Kentucky and
some other areas the last two years, playing a role in thefts and scores of
overdose deaths.

Congress has ordered an investigation of how the company marketed the
billion-dollar seller.