Glyphosate dispute: Bayer hopes for the Supreme Court

In the dispute over the health risks posed by the weed killer glyphosate, the US Supreme Court has asked the Washington government for an opinion. What does this mean for the Bayer Group?

The Leverkusen-based chemical company Bayer is hoping that it will still be able to reject millions in compensation payments in the USA. After an appeal to the Supreme Court in Washington, the latter has now asked for an opinion from the US government.

This suggests that the chief judges may find the case important enough to consider. Specifically, it is about a case in which a man attributes his cancer to the glyphosate-containing weed killer Roundup from Bayer and was awarded $ 25 million in damages in the first instance.

So far, defeats in all appeal procedures

Bayer now feels reassured because government institutions such as the EPA environmental agency had classified glyphosate as non-carcinogenic in the past. Bayer will therefore no longer enter into any settlement negotiations with plaintiffs for the time being, said Bayer in a statement.

According to the usual schedules, the US judges will now decide, probably until the end of June, whether they will admit the case. So far, Bayer has lost three trials in the first instance with millions in damages in the glyphosate lawsuit in the United States and has suffered defeats in all previous appeals. In one of these cases – that of Californian plaintiff Edwin Hardeman – the Leverkusen-based company went to the US Supreme Court.

Billion provision

Bayer brought the expensive legal conflicts around Roundup 2018 into the house with the purchase of US seed giant Monsanto, which cost more than $ 60 billion. After a first defeat in court in the summer of 2018, the number of plaintiffs had increased rapidly. The Bayer share price has roughly halved since then.

In the event that the Supreme Court does not want to deal with the glyphosate case or ultimately decides against Bayer, the group has set up provisions of $ 4.5 billion. The money would then be used to set up a program to deal with the demands of new plaintiffs for the next 15 years.

With information from Arthur Landwehr, ARD-Studio Washington.