Glyphosate defeat worth billions for Bayer in the USA -November 19, 2023 at 11:20 am EST

JEFFERSON (dpa-AFX) – A US jury has ordered the pharmaceutical and agricultural company Bayer to pay more than 1.5 billion US dollars in a glyphosate lawsuit. Three former users of the weedkiller Roundup were awarded corresponding payments on Friday. They blamed the controversial product for their cancer. The jury at the federal court in Jefferson City (Missouri) awarded James Draeger, Valorie Gunther and Dan Anderson a total of 61.1 million dollars in compensatory damages and 500 million dollars each in punitive damages. Juries in the USA often award plaintiffs large sums, which judges often later reduce.

“The verdict will not stand and we will definitely appeal against it,” Bayer said on Sunday in response to an inquiry. The amount of punitive damages alone violates the US Constitution. “Unlike previous cases, the courts in the recent cases have improperly allowed plaintiffs to misrepresent the regulatory and scientific facts,” the company said in a statement.

Bayer has “strong arguments” to have the recent rulings overturned. The company has won nine of the last 13 court cases and settled the majority of the lawsuits. “We will continue to defend the robust scientific and regulatory evidence in court, on appeal if necessary,” the DAX-listed company said. Bayer remained convinced of the safety of glyphosate.

Bayer brought the problems surrounding the glyphosate-based weed killer Roundup into the company in 2018 with the Monsanto takeover, which cost over 60 billion dollars. This was followed in the same year by a first judgment against the DAX-listed company, which set off a wave of lawsuits in the USA. In 2020, Bayer launched a multi-billion dollar program to settle the majority of the lawsuits – without admitting liability.

Bayer has already settled the majority of the lawsuits. In the spring, when presenting the business figures for 2022, it was announced that around 109,000 of the approximately 154,000 claims filed had been settled or did not meet the settlement criteria. As at December 31, 2022, Bayer’s provisions for settlements of existing and future glyphosate lawsuits still amounted to 6.4 billion dollars./jha/