Drug companies must pay for Medicare pricing scheme

A federal judge has found that AstraZeneca, Bristol-Myers Squibb and Schering Plough have to pay damages for gaming Medicare's pricing system and overcharging the government for drugs. The ruling came in a national class-action lawsuit. The drug companies' scheme had been deployed by a number of drug companies. They sold drugs to doctors at a deep discount to the average wholesale price and encouraged them to gain full reimbursement from Medicare. Lawyers for the company argued unsuccessfully that there was no attempt to deceive anyone and that there was a common understanding that AWP was not the price that providers paid.

- read the report on the judge's ruling