Claritin Maker Fined $340 Million

The Justice Department announced today that:

Schering Sales Corp. has agreed to plead guilty and pay a $52.5 million fine for violating the Anti-Kickback Statute for paying a kickback to a customer in exchange for the preferred treatment of Claritin; Schering Plough agreed to settle its False Claims Act liability and to pay the United States, 50 state Medicaid programs and certain Public Health Service entities $292,969,482 for failing to report its true best price for Claritin; and Schering Plough will enter into an agreement to correct its government pricing and Medicaid rebate reporting failures.

Simply put, if you lie and cheat, you'll be fined. Personally, since the kickback scheme is a criminal offense, I think someone should be doing jail time.