The US Supreme Court has agreed to hear a bid by German chemicals giant Bayer to put an end to a series of lawsuits over the weedkiller Roundup, the Malay Mail wrote.
Bayer had faced a series of litigation alleging its Roundup herbicide, which came with its US$63bn acquisition of US agrochemical group Monsanto in 2018, caused cancer, the 17 January report said.
Since the acquisition, Bayer has paid about US$10bn to settle lawsuits linked to its glyphosate-based Roundup.
The company has repeatedly said that decades of studies had shown Roundup and its active ingredient, glyphosate, were safe for human use.
The Supreme Court’s decision to take the case, which could lead to the dismissal of thousands of lawsuits, sent Bayer’s stocks soaring, a 21 January Natural News report said.
Bayer’s appeal centred on a legal doctrine known as federal pre-emption, with the company claiming that as the US Environmental Protection Agency (EPA) had repeatedly approved Roundup labels without a cancer warning, finding the active ingredient glyphosate “not likely to be carcinogenic”, it should be immune from state lawsuits alleging a “failure to warn”.
The Trump administration had backed Bayer’s stance that a federal statute on pesticide labels pre-empted state laws requiring warnings on products that could be carcinogenic, the Malay Mail wrote.
Although the Supreme Court’s review would focus on a specific case involving a US$1.25M award made by a Missouri jury, the Wall Street Journal noted that a ruling in Bayer’s favour – expected by early July – could “help lead to the dismissal of thousands of cases against the company”.
Welcoming the Supreme Court’s decision, Bayer CEO Bill Anderson said it was “an important step in our multi-pronged strategy to significantly contain this litigation”.
In addition to paying out billions of dollars in settlements to date, the company had set aside US$7.6bn specifically for glyphosate litigation, Natural News wrote.
A favourable Supreme Court ruling would cap the financial impact of the lawsuits and strengthen the company’s position in any future settlement negotiations, according to the report.
