(Reuters) -Kroger has agreed to pay $110 million to resolve a lawsuit by the state of Kentucky alleging the supermarket chain's pharmacies helped fuel a deadly opioid epidemic by flooding its communities with hundreds of millions of doses of addictive painkillers.

The suit alleged Kroger bought more than four billion morphine milligram equivalents of opioids for Kentucky between 2006 and 2019, roughly equivalent to 444 million opioid doses. The company distributed almost 194 million hydrocodone pills to its Kentucky pharmacies between 2006 and 2019,

Kentucky's attorney general says the state will receive $110 million to settle its lawsuit accusing one of the nation's largest grocery chains of helping fuel the opioid epidemic

Kentucky to get $110M in historic opioid settlement with Kroger

Coleman's office said the event at the Life Learning Center will reveal one of the largest opioid settlements in recent Kentucky history.

Coleman filed the lawsuit against Kroger in February 2024, alleging the grocery chain had failed to monitor for suspicious opioid orders.