A US Drug Enforcement Administration (DEA) database was made public in 2019 that tracks every opioid pill sold in the United States from 2006 through 2012. The database shows that the "vast majority of the 76 billion opioid pills produced and shipped from 2006 through 2012 to three companies", one of which was SpecGx, a subsidiary of Mallinckrodt. In those years SpecGx supplied 28.9 billion oxycodone pills, more than 80 for each person in the United States, and over 2 billion pills just in Florida.
In 2011 the DEA complained to Mallinckrodt about the problem of excessive prescription opioid shipments to pharmacies. DEA officials showed the company the hundreds of millions of doses of oxycodone it was shipping to distributors and the correspondingly high number of arrests being made for oxycodone possession and sale in those areas. Negotiations between the DEA and Mallinckrodt ensued, and in 2017 Mallinckrodt paid a $35 million fine to settle DEA complaints it did not adequately address suspicious opioid orders, acknowledging �certain aspects of Mallinckrodt�s system to monitor and detect suspicious orders did not meet" DEA standards.
Mallinckrodt announced in April 2019 a plan to change its name to Sonorant Therapeutics, and spin off �Mallinckrodt Inc.� as a separate company for its generics business. Legal liabilities that result from opioid litigation would �remain with Mallinckrodt Inc. or its subsidiaries following the separation.
In February 2020, the company struck a $1.6 billion deal with Florida and dozens of other states to settle lawsuits over its role in the US opioid crisis.