Another hole has formed in the dam between Bayer and a flood of lawsuits that accuse the corporation, and Monsanto before it, of creating and marketing a product that causes cancer.
The settlement, announced earlier this month, does not impact or settle the nearly 50,000 lawsuits alleging that the use of Roundup caused victims to develop non-Hodgkin’s lymphoma. Bayer has maintained that the allegations have no merit and that numerous studies show that Roundup’s active ingredient glyphosate is safe for humans. To date, however, the corporation has been unable to convince a jury of this argument. It has lost all three of its attempts to defend glyphosate as award amounts have climbed into the hundreds of millions of dollars.
This most recent settlement is over claims that the label found on every bottle of Roundup contained misleading information. Previously stating that glyphosate only affected an enzyme found in plants (a crucial aspect of its perceived safety to humans), the label will be changed to no longer contain the language. The change is a victory for those who argue that glyphosate not only attacks key enzymes in plants, but in humans as well.
In addition to the removal of the language, Bayer will pay nearly $40 million to members of the class who brought the lawsuit.
