© Reuters. FILE PHOTO: Bottles of Roundup, a brand owned by Bayer, for sale in a store in Manhattan, New York, U.S., June 30, 2022. REUTERS/Andrew Kelly/File Photo
By Brendan Pierson
(Reuters) – A U.S. appeals court on Monday refused to dismiss a Georgia doctor's lawsuit who claimed that Bayer AG (ETR:) The Roundup herbicide caused cancer, the latest setback in the German company's efforts to defend itself against thousands of similar cases involving potentially billions of dollars in liability.
A three-judge panel of the Atlanta-based 11th U.S. Circuit Court of Appeals rejected Bayer's (OTC:) argument that federal regulators' approval of Roundup protected the company from being sued under state law for failing to warn consumers about the risks of the product. . Several other appeals courts had previously reached the same conclusion in similar judgments.
If the 11th Circuit had broken with those other courts, the U.S. Supreme Court would have been more likely to take up the matter. Bayer has said he hopes a favorable Supreme Court ruling could limit his liability in the Roundup-related litigation, but the court has so far rejected his appeals.
David Carson, the plaintiff, said in his lawsuit that he was diagnosed with a type of cancer called malignant fibrous histiocytoma in 2016 after using Roundup for 30 years.
Lawsuits related to Roundup have dogged Bayer since it acquired the brand as part of its $63 billion purchase. Monsanto (NYSE:) in 2018. The company settled most of the Roundup claims that were pending against it in 2020 for up to $10.9 billion, but still faces more than 50,000 claims about the product.
Most plaintiffs allege that Roundup caused a type of cancer called non-Hodgkins lymphoma, although some say it caused other cancers. Bayer maintains that Roundup is safe and does not cause cancer.
“We are pleased that the court rejected Monsanto's defense and upheld the validity of Dr. Carson's claims,” David Frederick, Carson's attorney, said in an email. “The damage Monsanto caused with Roundup is immeasurable.”
Bayer has won 10 of the last 16 tests on Roundup. But in the cases he lost, he has been hit with more than $4 billion in jury verdicts since last October. Some of those awards are likely to be reduced on appeal because they exceed the U.S. Supreme Court's guidelines.
