Schering-Plough Faces Probe of Drug Pricing

Schering-Plough Corp., which was warned last month by federal regulators to improve quality control at four factories, revealed that the U.S. attorney’s office in Massachusetts is investigating its pricing practices. The investigation centers on pricing practices across the pharmaceutical industry, the company said in its 2000 annual report filed with the Securities and Exchange Commission. Schering-Plough said the U.S. attorney’s office also is investigating the possibility of “unlawful inflation” of certain government drug reimbursements. The U.S. attorney’s office in Massachusetts would not confirm or deny whether it was investigating the company. In addition, federal prosecutors were investigating whether the company’s sales of a product that was repackaged for sale by a managed-care organization should have been included in the company’s Medicaid best-price calculations, it said. Schering-Plough’s stock fell 35 cents to close at $37.70 on the NYSE. The stock fell from the $48 range in mid-February after it disclosed that the manufacturing problems would hurt first-quarter earnings.