Cigna's Express Scripts filed a lawsuit Tuesday challenging a federal report that places the blame for rising drug prices on pharmacy benefit managers, describing it as "seventy-four pages of unsupported innuendo" and calling for a retraction.

Months earlier, the agency released a report alleging the companies drove up the costs of some medications, including insulin.

Express Scripts, one of the country’s largest pharmacy benefit managers, sued the Federal Trade Commission (FTC) Tuesday and demanded the agency retract a report saying the industry middlemen

Express Scripts has filed suit against the Federal Trade Commission, demanding that the agency retract a damning report on the pharmacy benefit management industry. | Express Scripts has filed suit against the Federal Trade Commission,

At issue is a report released by the FTC in July called: “Pharmacy Benefit Managers: The Powerful Middlemen Inflating Drug Costs and Squeezing Main Street Pharmacies.” Express Scripts claims in the lawsuit that the report “is seventy-four pages of unsupported innuendo” leveled against it and other PBMs.

Express Scripts parent company Cigna alleges the Federal Trade Commission ignored more than 3 million pages of documents the pharmacy provided to investigators.

Pharmacy benefit manager Express Scripts sued the U.S. Federal Trade Commission on Tuesday over the regulator's recent drug pricing report, calling the report's conclusion that the prescription middlemen raise drug costs defamatory.

The owner of one of the three largest pharmacy middlemen in the United States on Tuesday filed suit to quash an attempt by the Federal Trade Commission to investigate industry practices. However, the suit relies on research that the health conglomerate helped pay for and was conducted by an economist who’s become wealthy arguing in support of huge mergers.

Express Scripts, one of the largest pharmacy benefit managers in the U.S., filed a lawsuit demanding that a recent FTC report on industry middlemen be vacated.

The FTC report said the companies responsible for controlling spending on drugs were sometimes steering patients toward more expensive medicines.

Cigna Group’s pharmacy benefit manager Express Scripts on Tuesday sued the U.S. Federal Trade Commission, alleging that the agency’s July report on the PBM industry was biased and defamatory and asking the court to order the FTC to withdraw the report.