If you or a loved one is experiencing health problems from using Roundup, you may be asking, what is the latest news on the Roundup lawsuit? In June of 2022, the Supreme Court rejected an appeal lodged by the pharmaceutical company Bayer, which requested the dismissal of thousands of lawsuits that claim Roundup, the company's weedkiller product, causes cancer. Bayer purchased Monsanto in 2018, which included Roundup as part of its brand.
The lost appeal holds a lower court's decision in place to award $25 million in damages to Californian Edward Harderman, who claims the nearly three decades of use of the Roundup product caused his non-Hodgkin's lymphoma.
The Supreme Court's decision to let the lower court's decision hold is powerful since the Hardeman lawsuit is a test case that sets a precedent for thousands of other pending cases which involve the same question of law. The loss of the appeal could result in billions of dollars in damages that may be awarded to other victims of the cancer-causing weedkiller. To get a better picture of how this could potentially impact you personally, contact us at Morgan and Morgan.
More Than 30,000 Roundup Lawsuits Are Still Pending
In May 2022, Monsanto reached agreements to settle about 80% of the currently pending claims concerning Roundup to the tune of $11 billion. About 100,000 lawsuits were settled when Bayer negotiated block settlement arrangements with lawyers representing a large number of plaintiffs. However, there are still about 26,000 cases that are still active, and more lawsuits are filed every day. With the Supreme Court's decision on Harderman's test case, the number of claims is expected to rise.
The Supreme Court rejected to hear another Roundup verdict which awarded Alberta and Alva Pilliod $87 million in damages which creates further optimism for plaintiffs whose cases are still pending. The couple who claimed their non-Hodgkin's lymphoma is a result of using Roundup was initially awarded $1 billion each in punitive damages by a jury, along with $55 million in compensatory damages combined. However, an Alameda County Superior Court judge reduced punitive damages to $70 million, citing that the original award was more than the constitutional limits set by the Supreme Court.