Ethics Newsline®

WASHINGTON
Six vitamin makers last week agreed to pay a record $1.1 billion to settle civil charges that they conspired to fix the prices of many common vitamins used by U.S. food and beverage companies, according to a report in the Washington Post.

The six firms are all based overseas, and while they are not well known to U.S. consumers, they supply the majority of vitamin supplements used in U.S. food products.

Hundreds of U.S. firms have sued the vitamin companies for allegedly inflating the cost of vitamin supplements added to everyday food items like breakfast cereal, bread, orange juice, and milk, the Post reported.

In May, criminal fines were levied against three of the vitamin makers, BASF AG of Germany, F. Hoffman La Roche & Co. Of Switzerland, and Rhone-Poulenc SA of France.

Those firms and three other manufacturers, Eisai Co., Daiiche Pharmaceutical Co., and Takeda Chemical Industries Ltd., all of Japan, then spent months hammering out the civil claims, the Post reported.

If approved by the court, the settlement would close the plaintiffs’ class-action civil lawsuit. The firms still face a potential onslaught of lawsuits from consumers.