Pfizer Settlement Nets District $430,372

The District will get a $430,372 chunk of a $33 million settlement that 42 states reached with Pfizer, which also agreed to a record $2.3 billion settlement for improperly marketing drugs.

The city's agreement involves Geodon, an antipsychotic drug that the city and other jurisdictions said was marketed for pediatric use, and use at dosage levels that had not been approved by the U.S. Food and Drug Administration, according to a news release from the Office of the Attorney General.

"This case demonstrates that the District and the states will continue to monitor the pharmaceutical industry for inappropriate and illegal promotion of the off-label use of its products," Attorney General Peter Nickles said in the news release.

The settlement highlights issues that Council member David A. Catania (I-At Large) raised with the controversial SafeRx Act, which narrowly passed the council in January. Catania, chairman of the Committee on Health, has repeatedly spoken about drug companies marketing medicines for "off-label" uses.

-- Nikita Stewart