The litigation, which was filed last March against Pfizer, Johnson & Johnson, Perrigo and others, blames drugmakers for selling too many products containing ephedrine and pseudoephedrine. As a result, a bunch of Arkansas counties say the drugmakers should have known their meds were being used to produce methamphetamine.

“We feel that the pharmaceutical companies were putting more product on the market, than what the market called for,” Independence County Judge Bill Hicks tells a KAIT reporter. Hicks worked with a group of attorneys and county leaders to come up with a plan of action. “We didn’t just wake up overnight and say, let’s go after the big money. Let’s go after the big people. We saw a problem and we are trying to fix it.”

You can watch the 4-and-a-half minute report here and meet a couple of the lawyers who have succeeded in getting nearly two dozen Arkansas counties to work together. Interestingly, the report features a lot of melodramatic music, and doesn’t include any comment from the pharmaceutical industry.

For more background, the Carroll County News ran this story not long ago.