For the third time in a row, Bayer has suffered a defeat in a US court over possible health risks from its glyphosate product Roundup. Further judgments are likely to follow in the coming months.
In the dispute over possible health effects of the product Roundup, which contains glyphosate, a court in the US state of California has sentenced the pharmaceutical and chemical company Bayer to a fine worth millions. After a series of victories in court, this is the third defeat in a row, which also imposes a large fine on Bayer.
Yesterday, the jury awarded a 57-year-old a total of $332 million. Of this, $7 million was awarded in compensatory damages and another $325 million in punitive damages. The plaintiff had been diagnosed with cancer; He attributed his illness to exposure to the weed killer.
Not acted negligently
In their verdict, the jury found Bayer right on two out of four points: They concluded that although the company did not warn about the risks of the weed killer Roundup, it also did not act negligently and that the product was not manufactured defectively .
Bayer said it was convinced it had strong arguments to prevail in an appeal. The company called the current judgment unfounded and the amount of damages unconstitutional. There were also legal errors in the process. In the United States, juries often award large sums to plaintiffs, which judges often later reduce.
Bayer takes action against all defeats in court
Bayer had won nine US cases before losing three. Yesterday the company also announced that it would also challenge the two previous defeats. According to the company’s announcement, Bayer remains convinced of the safety of glyphosate. Bayer denies any connection between the plaintiffs’ illnesses and the use of the weed killer Roundup. The company settled most of the Roundup lawsuits for up to $10.9 billion. Another 40,000 cases related to the weedkiller are pending.
The legal disputes over the weed killer have become a problem for Bayer since it took over the US company Monsanto in 2018. At that time, the DAX group took over Monsanto for $60 billion. In the same year, the first judgment against the Bavarian followed, which set off a wave of lawsuits in the USA. The then CEO of Bayer, Werner Baumann, who played a key role in the Monsanto deal, has now left the company.
In spring 2023, Bayer announced that out of a total of around 154,000 claims registered, around 109,000 had been compared or did not meet the comparison criteria. The company has set aside around $6.4 billion for settlements of existing and future glyphosate lawsuits.