The lawsuit alleges that these companies engaged in the following practices:

• Market allocation. Drugmakers allegedly refused to bid for certain contracts or submitted excessively high bids, enabling competitors to dominate specific market segments.
• Coordinated price hikes. By controlling market dynamics, the companies collectively raised prices for certain generics.
• Destruction of evidence. Aetna contends that written evidence of the agreements was intentionally destroyed to evade detection.

“Plaintiff brings this action to recover damages it incurred from egregious overcharges it paid for certain widely used generic drugs, arising from a far-reaching conspiracy among defendants and others to blatantly fix the price of such drugs,” the lawsuit said. “This conspiracy increased the defendants’ profits and that of others working with them, at the expense of plaintiff, a private health benefit provider, as well as consumers and the government.”

The co-conspirators included persons, firms, entities and corporations that have participated “in the violations alleged herein and have aided, abetted and performed acts and made statements in furtherance of the conspiracy,” according to the lawsuit.

Generic drugs typically reduce prices for medications when they enter the market, the lawsuit said, but the defendants “conspired to manipulate the relevant markets, allocate these markets amongst themselves and obstruct generic competition in an ongoing scheme to fix, increase, stabilize and/or maintain the price of generic drugs.”

Aetna is seeking treble damages, as well as injunctive, equitable and declaratory relief. The trial is set to begin in 2026.