Judge cuts lawsuits but says Monsanto's behavior is reprehensible

A federal judge in one of the lawsuits between pharmaceutical giant AG Bayer, who bought the agrochemical giant Monsanto in 2018, and plaintiffs who claim that his cancer was caused by Roundup herbicide reduced by 80 Millions of dollars the amount paid, reported Monday the Reuters agency.

According to Reuters, US District Judge Vince Chhabria in San Francisco has found that, although the evidence corroborates Bayer's $ 5.27 million in damages to Edwin Hardeman, punitive damages should be reduced $ 75 to $ 20 million. Chhabria wrote that Monsanto "deserved to be punished" for ignoring security considerations and that his conduct was "reprehensible". But he also found that the relationship between punitive and compensatory damages was too high, "particularly in the absence of evidence showing the intentional concealment of a known crime, or an obvious risk to safety. "

The Wall Street Journal reported that although Chhabria found mixed scientific evidence about whether Roundup exposure was a risk factor for non-Hodgkin's lymphoma, he wrote: "The evidence at trial have painted a portrait of a company focused on attacking or attacking people who have expressed concerns. "The paper notes that, although Bayer lost two other cases involving Roundup (in a case involving a jury award of more than $ 2 billion) and facing thousands of others, he managed to limit payments:

Similarly, Bayer was successful in ensuring that a trial judge reduced by $ 289.2 million the verdict rendered by the first roundup jury in the case of a gardener of the San Francisco Bay, bringing it to $ 78.5 million. The company is now appealing this lightened amount. Bayer is asking a judge to lower the verdict of a third jury, also in northern California, of more than $ 2 billion allocated in May to a couple who used Roundup at their home.

In Mr. Hardeman's trial, unlike the other two judges, the jurors first examined whether the science linked Roundup to his non-Hodgkin's lymphoma before addressing the issue of Monsanto's liability. The trio of jury verdicts and 13,000 additional applications linking Roundup to cancer sent Bayer based in Germany into turmoil. Its shares have lost more than 30% in value over the past year, investors fearing that the legal battle will take years to resolve and end up costing Bayer billions.

According to Reuters, Chhabria pointed out that he was required to reduce punitive damages due to precedents established by the Supreme Court, but he found the original jury decision to be reasonable.

The International Agency for Research on Cancer (IARC) of the World Health Organization has estimated that the main ingredient of Roundup, glyphosate, a "probable carcinogen" in 2015 – a position corroborated by a study this year that glyphosate exposure was associated with a much higher risk of developing non-lymphoma cancers. Hardeman says that he's been using herbicide on a large property north of San Francisco for more than two decades.

Monsanto insists that Roundup is a safe place, but court documents have shown that he was involved in overseeing so-called "independent" assessments of his safety. The Environmental Protection Agency is also of the opinion that Roundup is safe if used in accordance with the label instructions, although an EPA official, previously responsible of the assessment of his safety, has been the victim of allegations of suspicious relationship with Monsanto.

That said, there is no consensus on the degree of risk that Roundup really represents. David Eastmond, toxicologist at the University of California, author of an article on glyphosate published on the occasion of the joint FAO / WHO meeting on pesticide residues of the World Health Organization. Health, told NPR earlier this year that IARC had simply discovered that the chemical could cause cancer without assessing the likelihood is to pose a risk to the public.

"From what I understand, if glyphosate causes cancer, it's a fairly low carcinogen, which means you'll need doses high enough to cause it," he said. said Eastmond to NPR, adding that it was based in part on its findings. on a large number of studies funded by Monsanto that have not been considered by IARC.

"We are delighted that the judge rejected Monsanto's motion to dismiss the verdict and acknowledged that it deserved to be punished," said Jennifer Moore, a member of Hardeman's legal team, at Reuters. . "We do not agree with a reduction of the verdict of the jury."

Negative reactions against Roundup are also developing elsewhere. Austrian lawmakers recently approved a total ban on glyphosate, positioning it as the first EU member state to do so and creating the possibility that other countries will do the same.