\nProduct safety, product design litigation should be able to move forward<\/i><\/p>
DALLAS--(BUSINESS WIRE)--A U.S. Supreme Court ruling that the makers of Roundup weedkiller cannot be sued for failing to include a cancer warning on its label will not preclude litigation from moving forward says a group of attorneys representing thousands of cancer victims who used the herbicide for years without suspecting it could cause them cancer.<\/p>
\n\u201cWhile we\u2019re disappointed with the Durnell<\/i> ruling, the language of the decision makes clear that its scope is limited to failure-to-warn claims,\u201d says trial team partner Gibbs Henderson<\/a> of the Nachawati Law Group<\/a> in Dallas. \u201cIn fact, Justice Kavanaugh\u2019s decision explicitly states that \u2018Monsanto is not invoking the mere fact of registration as a complete defense to state tort suits. Rather, Monsanto is relying on the EPA\u2019s specific determination that cancer warnings are not required for glyphosate-based pesticide labels.\u2019<\/p> \n\u201cIn other words, the court\u2019s majority acknowledged that non-warning claims were not even at issue in Durnell<\/i>,\u201d said Henderson.<\/p> \nThe cases against Bayer, a German agrochemical manufacturer that acquired Roundup\u2019s original producer, Monsanto, in 2018 have generated multibillion-dollar verdicts. Henderson said that many of the associated claims, including those focused on the dangers of Roundup\u2019s formulation, should not be affected by the Durnell<\/i> ruling and will continue to provide plaintiffs\u2019 attorneys a strong mechanism to hold Monsanto accountable.<\/p> \n\u201cBoth our firm and others have taken design defect claims to the jury, and many jurors across the country have concluded, consistent with the applicable standard in most states, that Roundup is unreasonably dangerous because it failed to perform as safely as an ordinary consumer would expect when used as intended,\u201d he said. \u201cWe fully expect to have continued success with this claim in our upcoming Roundup trials.\u201d<\/p> \nThere remains debate among public health agencies about whether Roundup\u2019s key ingredient, glyphosate, causes cancer. The World Health Organization\u2019s International Agency for Research on Cancer classified the chemical as \u201cprobably carcinogenic\u201d in 2015, but the Environmental Protection Agency has determined that it\u2019s not likely to cause cancer in humans when used as directed. Many health advocates, however, contend the EPA\u2019s approval of glyphosate-based weedkillers relied too heavily on studies that were funded by Monsanto and was driven by political pressure.<\/p> \nAbout 200,000 Roundup-related claims have been made against Bayer, mostly from individual consumers. The company has stopped using glyphosate in Roundup sold in the U.S. residential lawn and garden market.<\/p> \nAbout Nachawati Law Group<\/b><\/p> \nNachawati Law Group represents individuals in mass tort litigation, businesses and governmental entities in contingent litigation and individual victims in complex personal injury litigation. For more information, visit https:\/\/ntrial.com<\/a>.<\/p>