According to a CBC report in Canada, the world’s most heavily used herbicide appears to be in trouble following a $2 billion US damages award to a California couple who claim that the weed killer Roundup gave them cancer.
On Monday, a jury in Oakland ruled that the German pharmaceutical giant Bayer — the new owners of the herbicide’s maker, Monsanto — are liable because of past failures to warn about the health risks that may be associated with the popular glyphosate product.
The plaintiffs, Alva and Alberta Pilliod, used the weed killer around their Northern California home for more than three decades, and in recent years both have been diagnosed with non-Hodgkin’s lymphoma.
Yesterday’s decision is the third major loss that the company has suffered in the California courts since Bayer acquired Monsanto in a $66 billion US merger last spring.
Bayer issued an apology for the project over the weekend, calling it “completely inappropriate” and promising to hire a law firm to conduct an external investigation.
Although it seems that the story is only beginning, with a company executive acknowledging that it is “very likely” that such lists were also drawn up in other European countries.
Roundup also faces other challenges.
