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The settlement makes J&J the fourth drugmaker to reach such a deal ahead of the trial, slated to begin later this month in federal court in Cleveland. The trial is considered a bellwether for thousands of opioid-related lawsuits that municipalities and states have filed against drugmakers. (Randazzo, 10/1)

“The settlement allows the company to avoid the resource demands and uncertainty of a trial as it continues to seek meaningful progress in addressing the nation’s opioid crisis,” Johnson & Johnson and its subsidiary Janssen Pharmaceuticals said in a statement Tuesday night. “The company recognizes the opioid crisis is a complex public health challenge and is working collaboratively to help communities and people in need.” Under the terms, the company resolves all claims by the counties with no admission of liability. (Higham, Horwitz and Bernstein, 10/1)

Johnson & Johnson agreed to pay more than $20 million to avoid the first federal trial in which it faced accusations of helping fuel the opioid epidemic by mishandling its painkillers. Under the deal, announced late Tuesday, J&J will pay two Ohio counties $10 million in cash, $5 million to cover their legal expenses and make $5.4 million in charitable donations to groups fighting the opioid epidemic. The company didn’t admit any wrongdoing as part of the deal. (Feeley, 10/1)

The division of Johnson & Johnson that made the opioid products, Janssen Pharmaceuticals, has said that those products accounted for less than 1 percent of total opioid prescriptions written in the United States. The settlement was not nearly as sizable as the tentative agreement reached by Purdue Pharma with opioid plaintiffs last month, but that deal was intended to release the company from all federal litigation and many state cases as well. (Hoffman, 10/1)

Johnson & Johnson and two Ohio counties have reached a $20.4 million settlement that removes the corporation from the first federal lawsuit against opioid manufacturers, scheduled to begin later this month. In a statement released Tuesday, the healthcare giant said the agreement with Cleveland's Cuyahoga and Akron's Summit counties allows it "to avoid the resource demands and uncertainty of a trial." (Neuman, 10/2)

Teva is the only drugmaker that would remain in the Cleveland trial if Johnson & Johnson’s settlement is finalized. The other defendants still in the trial are distributors AmerisourceBergen, Cardinal Health, Henry Schein and McKesson, along with the pharmacy chain Walgreens. With most drugmakers out of the initial trial, it could mean less focus on how they marketed powerful painkillers to doctors and more on whether distributors shipped opioid orders that they believed were suspicious. (Mulvihill, 10/1)

Frank Gallucci, an attorney for Cuyahoga County, said that “this settlement represents an important milestone in the litigation as it provides much needed funding for the community while also providing financial support for programs specifically addressing opioid exposed babies and their families.” (Heisig, 10/1)

A group of drug retailers and distributors asked an Ohio federal appeals court Tuesday to disqualify the judge overseeing national opioid litigation after the judge himself denied their requests. Walmart, Walgreens, CVS, Rite Aid and drug distributors AmerisourceBergen, McKesson and Cardinal Health told the 6th U.S. Circuit Court of Appeals in Cincinnati that Cleveland-based U.S. District Judge Dan Polster is not impartial. Polster made the initial ruling on their claim, declining Thursday to remove himself from the massive multidistrict litigation and insisting he has remained neutral. (Carr-Smyth, 10/1)

Purdue Pharma LP has proposed a settlement in bankruptcy court that could provide as much as $10 billion to help U.S. communities cope with the opioid epidemic. But for some states, the moral cost of accepting the deal is too high because it relies on even more sales of OxyContin, the highly addictive painkiller that helped create the public-health crisis. The settlement offer calls for Purdue’s owners, the Sackler family, to pay at least $3 billion over seven years, with another $1 billion from current Purdue assets. (Larson and Feeley, 10/2)

Makers of prescription painkillers are climbing higher after Dow Jones reported that the companies are looking to use Purdue Pharma LP’s bankruptcy as a model to settle their own lawsuits. Mallinckrodt Plc and Endo International Plc jumped Tuesday morning as Wall Street gauged what shape their settlements might take. The two, plus drugmaker Teva Pharmaceutical Industries Ltd., are facing similar claims related to their role in sparking the opioid crisis. (Lipschultz, 10/1)