In Devastation of Opioids: Family Spied New Market
摧毀阿片類藥物之際 普渡制藥家族嗅到了新的商機
By Danny Hakim, Roni Caryn Rabin and William Rashbaum
文/丹尼·哈基姆,羅尼·卡琳·拉賓,威廉·拉什保姆
The Sacklers had a new plan.
薩克勒家族有了新計劃。
It was 2014, and the company the family had controlled for two generations, Purdue Pharma,
那是2014年,因為公司高度上癮的阿片類止痛藥奧施康定的營銷連年遭受調查,官司不斷,
had been hit with years of investigations and lawsuits over its marketing of the highly addictive opioid painkiller OxyContin,
薩克勒家族經營了兩代人的“普渡制藥”遭到了重創,
at one point pleading guilty to a federal felony and paying more than $600 million in criminal and civil penalties.
還一度承認犯有聯邦重罪,并支付了6億多美元的刑事和民事罰款。
But as the country’s addiction crisis worsened, the Sacklers spied another business opportunity.
然而,隨著美國毒癮危機的惡化,薩克勒家族發現了另一個商機。
They could increase their profits by selling treatments for the very problem their company had helped to create: addiction to opioids.
他們可以一邊助長阿片類藥物成癮這一問題,一邊出售治療阿片類藥物成癮的藥物來提高利潤。
Details of the effort, named Project Tango, have come to light in lawsuits filed by the attorneys general of Massachusetts and New York.
這一項目,項目名為“探戈計劃”,的細節已經在馬薩諸塞州和紐約州檢察長提出的多起訴訟中曝光了。
Together, the cases lay out the extensive involvement of a family
這些案件共同揭示了薩克勒家族的累累罪行:
that has largely escaped personal legal consequences for Purdue Pharma’s role
過去二十年里,阿片類藥物泛濫讓無數人因為服用過量付出了生命的代價,
in an epidemic that has led to hundreds of thousands of overdose deaths in the past two decades.
盡管普渡制藥對此脫不了干系,薩克勒家族的人卻逃脫了相關的法律后果。
The filings cite numerous records, emails and other documents
這些文件引用了大量錄音、電子郵件及其他資料,
showing that members of the family continued to push aggressively to expand the market for OxyContin and other opioids for years
它們紛紛顯示,盡管該公司在2007年的一次認罪協議中承認,它歪曲了毒品的成癮性和濫用的可能性,
after the company admitted in a 2007 plea deal that it had misrepresented the drug’s addictive qualities and potential for abuse.
但那以后的多年里,該家族的成員仍在積極擴大奧施康定等阿片類藥物的市場。

The business potential of adding addiction treatment to the mix was illustrated in internal company charts and diagrams.
公司內部的圖表顯示了將成癮治療納入其治療方案的潛在商機。
"Pain treatment and addiction are naturally linked,"
“疼痛治療和成癮之間有著自然的聯系,”
one Project Tango document, included in the New York complaint, said.
紐約的訴狀所包含的一份“探戈計劃”文件里寫道。
It depicted a big blue funnel.
文件里還畫了一個藍色的大漏斗(來說明二者的關系)。
The fat end was labeled "pain treatment"; the narrow end was labeled "opioid addiction treatment."
漏斗寬大的一端被畫上了“疼痛治療”的標記;細窄的一端則畫上了“阿片類藥物成癮治療”的標記。
The company, the document said, could make money at both ends of the funnel as an "end-to-end pain provider."
該文件稱,作為“端到端的痛苦制造者”,無論是哪一端,公司都可以獲利。
Dr. Kathe Sackler, one of the eight family members sitting on Purdue’s board,
凱特·塞克勒博士是普渡制藥董事會的八名家族成員之一,
instructed employees to devote "immediate attention" to the effort,
馬薩諸塞州的案件存檔的一封電子郵件顯示,
according to an email included in the Massachusetts filing.
她曾指示員工“立即投入”“探戈計劃”。
The two lawsuits are part of a burst of recent litigation that has taken aim at the Sacklers,
這兩起訴訟還只是近期集體爆發的一系列訴訟之冰山一角,
a far-flung billionaire family that has a network of trusts and companies in the United States and abroad.
這些訴訟都將矛頭指向了勢力龐大,國內外都有托拉斯和分公司的億萬富翁家族——薩克勒家族。
Their philanthropic gifts have built namesake wings
該家族不僅用慈善捐贈成立了同名的慈善網絡,
housing the Temple of Dendur at the Metropolitan Museum of Art in New York and oriental antiquities at the Louvre in Paris,
收藏了紐約大都會藝術博物館的丹都爾神廟和巴黎盧浮宮的東方古董,
as well as a library at the University of Oxford and a scientific institute at Columbia University.
還給牛津大學捐了一個圖書館,給哥倫比亞大學捐了一個科學研究所。
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