An Australian court has dismissed a class action lawsuit claiming German chemical company Bayer’s glyphosate-based weedkiller causes a type of blood cancer,
Australian Federal Court Justice Michael Lee ruled on 25 July there was insufficient evidence to conclude that Roundup could cause non-Hodgkins lymphoma (NHL), the report on the same date said.
The decision gave the firm some respite after facing similar cases in the USA, Reuters wrote.
More than 1,000 people had joined the lawsuit, claiming Roundup’s active ingredient, glyphosate, had caused their NHL, the report said.
In his ruling, Justice Michael Lee of Australia’s Federal Court said he had reviewed three types of scientific studies – epidemiological, animal studies and mechanistic evidence – looking at the links between glyphosate and lymphoma and was not satisfied there was sufficient evidence that the chemical caused the cancer in humans.
“It is not proven in this proceeding on a balance of probabilities... that throughout the relevant period, use of, and or exposure to Roundup products increased an individual’s risk of developing NHL,” Lee was quoted as saying.
The claimants’ law firm, Maurice Blackburn, said it was reviewing the ruling before deciding whether to appeal.
The lead claimant, 41-year-old Kelvin McNickle, said he had used Roundup for over two decades to spray weeds on his family’s property and while working for a vegetation management company. He developed non-Hodgkins lymphoma aged 35.
Bayer has always maintained that Roundup and its active ingredient, glyphosate, are safe. Since buying the product’s owner US agrochemical company Monsanto in 2018, it has faced lawsuits over Roundup in the USA, where there were 50,000 outstanding claims, the report said.
Although Bayer had won 15 out of the last 20 US trials, it has had to pay more than US$4bn in damages in cases in late 2023 and early 2024, Reuters wrote. Some of the amounts awarded had since been reduced.
In the USA, class actions are decided by a jury, while that is not the case in Australia.
Despite the difference in the Australian and US judicial systems, Bayer spokesman Philipp Blank was quoted as saying “we will … try to leverage the conclusion of the very science-based approach from the Australian legal system in the litigation in the USA.”
The class action brought by Maurice Blackburn against Bayer subsidiaries was one of around 40 similar cases filed outside the USA, most of them in Canada, Reuters wrote.
