Monsanto Ordered To Pay $289 Million In Roundup Cancer Trial (bbc.com) 219
An anonymous reader shares a report from the BBC involving glyphosate, the world's most common weedkiller: Chemical giant Monsanto has been ordered to pay $289 million in damages to a man who claimed herbicides containing glyphosate had caused his cancer. In a landmark case, a Californian jury found that Monsanto knew its Roundup and RangerPro weedkillers were dangerous and failed to warn consumers. It's the first lawsuit to go to trial alleging a glyphosate link to cancer. Monsanto denies that glyphosate causes cancer and says it intends to appeal against the ruling.
The claimant in the case, groundskeeper Dewayne Johnson, is among more than 5,000 similar plaintiffs across the US. Mr Johnson was diagnosed with non-Hodgkin's lymphoma in 2014. His lawyers said he regularly used a form of RangerPro while working at a school in Benicia, California. Jurors found on Friday that the company had acted with "malice" and that its weedkillers contributed "substantially" to Mr Johnson's terminal illness.
The claimant in the case, groundskeeper Dewayne Johnson, is among more than 5,000 similar plaintiffs across the US. Mr Johnson was diagnosed with non-Hodgkin's lymphoma in 2014. His lawyers said he regularly used a form of RangerPro while working at a school in Benicia, California. Jurors found on Friday that the company had acted with "malice" and that its weedkillers contributed "substantially" to Mr Johnson's terminal illness.
The only problem (Score:3, Insightful)
Is that roundup doesn't cause cancer.
Re:The only problem (Score:5, Informative)
FTFA: http://www.iarc.fr/en/media-ce... [www.iarc.fr]
https://www.nytimes.com/2017/0... [nytimes.com]
Re:The only problem (Score:5, Insightful)
FTFA: http://www.iarc.fr/en/media-ce... [www.iarc.fr] https://www.nytimes.com/2017/0... [nytimes.com]
Let's start with the simple one! NYT is not a scientific, peer-reviewed journal. It also has a bit of a history of being a lousy place to get your science news.
The IARC thing is two pages and doesn't include a single reference, citation, or smidgen of data. I'd not be able to use it as a citation for anything other than for it being considered a probable carcinogen by the IARC--it's remarkably free of statistics, and citations which is actually rather concerning, especially given how cancer actually works & why we have had the admission that most cancers are caused by...well...failing to die.
If you're trying to support a claim of 'causes cancer,' there's no substitute for quality peer-reviewed research when it comes to supporting the claims, especially since there's been some rather long-term problems with the quality of the research and how it gets interpreted.
The IARC paper places Roundup in group 2A, which it defines as:
Group 2A means that the agent is probably carcinogenic to humans. This category is used when there is limited evidence of carcinogenicity in humans and sufficient evidence of carcinogenicity in experimental animals. Limited evidence means that a positive association has been observed between exposure to the agent and cancer but that other explanations for the observations (called chance, bias, or confounding) could not be ruled out. This category is also used when there is limited evidence of carcinogenicity in humans and strong data on how the agent causes cancer.
The translation for those not familiar with cancer research: "We need money for more research." You don't really get funding if you are wanting to show that something probably doesn't cause cancer...which is not something I'm comfortable with, so I pretty quickly figured out I want nothing to do with this field of research if I could help it.
Re: The only problem (Score:2)
The big question then becomes how to decouple the researchers from the funders to eliminate bias. The easiest, actually the only way I could think of, is for these companies to be mandated to provide the funding to a third party who then administers it. I think,
Re: The only problem (Score:3, Informative)
I'm sure Monsanto has lots of money to fund a study aiming to prove that glyphosate doesn't cause cancer.
You can never prove that something doesn't cause cancer. That's not how science works. All you can do is try to prove that it DOES cause cancer, and repeatedly fail. Which is what has happened every time anyone has tested it.
Re: (Score:3)
I'm sure Monsanto has lots of money to fund a study aiming to prove that glyphosate doesn't cause cancer.
You can never prove that something doesn't cause cancer. That's not how science works. All you can do is try to prove that it DOES cause cancer, and repeatedly fail. Which is what has happened every time anyone has tested it.
Except you're not likely to manage better than 'maybe' since you get cancer pretty much by failing to die of something else--all cancers are ultimately caused by errors in DNA copying not being caught and cleared out. The systems that handle this are actually very, very good, with very low error rates, but...well, try enough times and you will have cancerous cells managing to survive long enough to be detected, especially as we get better at detection.
So, given that pretty much 'is not dead' is a confoundi
Re: (Score:2)
Which is what has happened every time anyone has tested it.
The parent's link above says otherwise. Limited evidence of carcinogenicity in humans, from studies of exposures, and convincing evidence of carcinogenicity in laboratory animals. The World Health Organization rates glyphosate as "probably carcinogenic to humans."
Re: The only problem (Score:2)
There is not convincing evidence of carcinogenic effects in animals. They're simply wrong about that, and, as such, have obviously misclassified it.
That said, group 2a also involves "shift work" as a possible carcinogen. I would love to see what kind of shift work their laboratory animals were doing.
Re: (Score:2)
Cancer is a disease. A disease is a chronic condition that degrades the organism.
Does Monsanto's existence net improve lives? Yes.
That is all.
I await my downmod now by those who wish to silence those who do not share their worldview.
Re:The only problem (Score:5, Insightful)
Now the politics comes into play. A court FINDS that the chemicals used DO cause cancer. BUT, it is politically "expedient" to those in (real) power to keep Monsanto in business - not getting sued to shreds. So we can unfortunately but safely predict the will wear the victim out to death and then quietly "settle" behind closed doors (for much less, plus a shut-up sign-here "agreement").
neonicotinoid = round up (Score:5, Informative)
Did not Bayer just acquire Monsanto for 66 Billion ? That amount should just about cover the damages that are going to be discovered. This cover up is going to make Mesothelioma look like a common cold. Bayer knew long ago that Round-Up was malignant and caused a wide variety of issues, up to and including Colony Collapse Disorder, or the disappearing Bee issue felt around the world.
https://www.washingtonpost.com... [washingtonpost.com]
Re: (Score:2)
From what I can quickly find online, glyphosate doesn't seem to be a neonicotinoid. Citation that it is?
I don't contest that there are other health concerns with glyphosate.
Re: (Score:2)
Are you suggesting this is yet another instance of US courts finding foreign companies guilty and subjecting them to outrageous amounts in damages, as a form of anti-competitive tariff? Sounds reasonable.
Re: (Score:2)
Re: The only problem (Score:4, Informative)
The EU has not banned glyphosate. In fact they just relicensed it last November for another 5 years
Re: (Score:2)
If the scientists were being paid by a disinterested party, then you'd have a valid point. Unfortunately there's a very large amount of "science" that is twisted into confirming whatever the party that's paying for it wants to prove. And any findings that dispute that somehow never get published.
Now once upon a time University Science Departments were reliable. They were dirt poor, but they were reliable. (They usually depended on donations by the alumni.) But after various alterations in funding, pate
Re:The only problem (Score:5, Informative)
Nothing on your list is true in the sense that you are trying to make.
*Eggs are bad for you came from a time before the whole picture was known and scientists knew that high cholesterol was bad for you and that eggs in particular contained high amounts of cholesterol. So not warning about egg consumption then would have been negligent. Later research showed that there is no link between digested cholesterol and blood level cholesterol and thus it turned out that eggs was fine. So no this have not been switching between yes and no every other week (it happened only once) and it was not due to partisan sponsoring but the very fact that the more we know, the more we actually know.
*Vaccines have never been labelled as 100% safe. That there are side effects for every working medical substance have been know for hundreds of years and there is no scientist or doctor that even once would believe that something is 100% safe.
*Fluoridation of drinking water in the therapeutic levels that is done to increase dental health have never been proven to be harmful. The case where it was proven to be harmful was from a place in China where the water had been contaminated with high levels of fluoride. As always the dose makes the poison and there is a big whooping difference between contamination and a therapeutic dose.
Re: (Score:2)
Sorry, but I've got to disagree a bit.
The evidence against dietary cholesterol was always extremely weak. It got picked up the way fad diets are always picked up, but there was enough surface plausibility that it became official, even overcoming the Dairy lobby.
Fluoridation of drinking water at the levels done to increase dental health has the problem of making the teeth slightly more brittle. This is clearly harmful, even though the main effect, reducing carries, is beneficial. And it's been shown to di
Re: (Score:2)
Yes the link was extremely weak and I'm even unsure if Science ever said that eggs where bad, this all seams to be from Medical Doctors in the 1970:ies that made the logical conclusion that eggs should increase the blood cholesterol levels. It was first when Science was applied that it was found out that this was not the cause.
But none of these little details matter, the AC parent tried to paint a picture that Science can not be trusted due to Science changing opinions every two seconds which I think that y
Re: The only problem (Score:4, Insightful)
Scientists claimed DDT is safe to spray on kids
It is. DDT was banned because it was linked to a decline in bird populations, not because of harm to humans.
Ditto agent orange
Why would you spray agent orange on children? It's an herbicide. Unless your kids name is Herb, you're just wasting money.
Anyway, agent orange on it's own isn't harmful to humans. The issue with the batches used was that they were contaminated with TCDD. And it was those eeeeevil scientists who discovered and pointed out the contamination issue.
Ditto morning sickness pills
Again, not sure why you're giving these to kids. Additionally, I'm not sure what you think the problem here is.
Ditto burning people at stake since they knew the Earth is flat
If you think that scientists were burning people at the stake, or claiming that the world is flat, you are one seriously deluded individual.
Scientists are good/useful but they operate best at theoretical level and need to be super super super careful before proceeding to anything beyond that, and that is not happening all the time
Whereas you operate at the "I'm just gonna make shit up" level, and think that this somehow makes you better than scientists.
Re: The only problem (Score:2)
"Safe" is relative. Water is safe to spray on your kids, but that doesn't mean that water can't kill you. Salt and vinegar are both potentially harmful, but you feed them to your children.
The research on DDT suggest some possible risk but there's no conclusive evidence of harm at normal exposure levels, and the benefits generally far outweigh the risks. Like with nay other substance it's best to use it only when needed, and take proper safety precautions, but I would have no qualms about spraying it on c
Re: No, he was careful enough, you were lying. (Score:3)
The link is the same link you find between water and cancer: some people who use it also happen to get cancer. Idiots think that this is somehow significant.
Re: (Score:2)
Re: No, he was careful enough, you were lying. (Score:3)
It would be valid, yes. But since no such link has been demonstrated, my comparison is entirely valid.
Re:The only problem (Score:5, Interesting)
Is that roundup doesn't cause cancer.
We don't know that. Glyphosate / Roundup causes tumors in test animals at high dosage. It has not been shown to correlate with cancer in humans, but not many studies have been done, and Monsanto has lobbied the EPA to "reinterpret" some of the results.
Given the ambiguous data, $289M seems excessive, and will likely be reduced on appeal, where judges will decide, and there will be no sympathetic jury.
Eating food grown in fields treated with glyphosate is unlikely to be a problem. But if you work directly with glyphosate, you should take reasonable precautions. Wear gloves, long sleeves, long pants. Carry a bottle of soapy water so you can rinse quickly if it spills on your skin.
The best solution is to transition to robotic weed control. Robots can use image recognition and targeted piezoelectric applicators to spray glyphosate directly onto the weed leaves, while spraying very little on the crop or on the ground. This can reduce herbicide use by 95%.
Re: (Score:1)
Fuck monsanto, just have the bots pull the fucking weeds.
Re:The only problem (Score:5, Interesting)
Fuck monsanto, just have the bots pull the fucking weeds.
That would be much slower and require a far most sophisticated mechanism.
A piezoelectric sprayer is what your inkjet printer uses. They are cheap, reliable, and fast.
A 95% reduction that works and is affordable, is much better than a 100% solution that is never deployed.
Re: (Score:2)
just have the bots pull the fucking weeds.
That would be much slower and require a far most sophisticated mechanism.
Both ideas are dumb. The best approach is to simply cut the weeds, before they produce seed heads. Let them lie where they fall, because they will serve as mulch. Not only does it not require chemicals but it provides a benefit. Cutting stuff is relatively easy and you could reasonably put multiple cutting tools on the same bot so that it doesn't go out of service if one does fail.
Re: (Score:2)
The best approach is to simply cut the weeds
Many weeds will regrow from the root.
Glyphosate kills the entire plant.
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Many weeds will regrow from the root.
That's why you use a robot. It doesn't get upset if it has to cut the weed again.
Glyphosate kills the entire plant.
It also persists in anaerobic soil conditions created by mechanical tilling and harvesting. It's simply not acceptable.
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Re: (Score:2)
The plaintiff will be long dead by then.
This guy was covered in it, breathing it, daily (Score:3, Insightful)
Exactly. Apparently this guy was constantly working with 50 pound bags of the stuff every day or whatever. Breathing in the dust all time, having it on his skin dissolved in sweat all the time, etc. That's very different from the tiny amount of residue a typical person might be exposed to.
Sunlight increases cancer risk (and has health benefits), the human body naturally produces formaldehyde, a carcinogen. All the other things make your exposure and my exposure to Roundup statistical noise, insignificant co
Re:This guy was covered in it, breathing it, daily (Score:5, Informative)
Roundup is a liquid, not a powder, and the applicators are designed to produce droplets, not an atomized mist that can be inhaled. If he was breathing it, he was doing something wrong.
Re: (Score:3)
The article I readed stated he got completely drenched in the stuff twice. I think we can assume he was doing something wrong.
Re: (Score:2)
Roundup has been a common farm chemical since before many of you were born. If the cause+effect is really that legitimate here, then there should be a lot more farmers in this guy's position.
Re: (Score:2)
Are there? Would they be the farmers, or the hired laborers? Would the hired laborers be able to either trace the blame or hire a lawyer or document what has happened?
Your basic point is correct, that if this is true one wold expect there to be a lot of victims. I'm just not convinced that they'd know why they got sick or be able to prove it, or even afford to do anything about it even if both of the preceding conditions were met.
FWIW, I'm not convinced that he is correctly attributing the cause of his c
Thanks. I wonder if it's similar (Score:2)
Thanks. I didn't know if it was mixed with water after sale in commercial / large applications. You can tell I'm not a farmer.
You mention "the applicators are designed to". I use some stuff that is sprayed and then the droplets harden. I the end up sorting them by size. to spraying process produces mostly droplets in the size range it's designed to, and fewer that are much larger or much smaller. I'm also reminded of the sprayer on the end of my garden hose, which mostly produces a stream of very large drop
Re: (Score:2)
I'm also reminded of the sprayer on the end of my garden hose, which mostly produces a stream of very large drops, and also produces a mist around the sprayer which cools me off on a hot day..
In addition to glyphosate, Roundup also contains surfactants that inhibit misting. A garden hose is typically about 40 PSI. Roundup sprayers are much lower pressure.
Insecticide sprayers use very high pressure and tiny nozzles, because they need the mist to reach the underside of the leaves, where bugs are more likely to be. But with herbicides, that is unnecessary, and misting is just wasteful, as well as potentially harmful.
So THAT is how I can get the mosquitoes (Score:2)
> Insecticide sprayers use very high pressure and tiny nozzles, because they need the mist to reach the underside of the leaves, where bugs are more likely to be.
Interesting. Makes sense. I read that the mosquitoes are probably hanging out on the bottom of the leaves in my hedges, but I wasn't sure how to get a good spray there. A high-pressure mist makes sense.
Re: (Score:2)
Why use herbicides at all in a robotic weed removal application? Just have the bot zap the undesired plants with lasers or something.
Re: (Score:2)
I agree with you that switching to robot mechanical weed control is probably going to be the safest long term answer. We still need to solve pest control though and the robots are a long way from being able to do that.
I think the though that this judgement shows that there are some types of civil cases where a jury just isnt appropriate. We probably need a constitutional amendment; restricting jury trials in civil cases where the proximate cause of the alleged damage isn't expected to be 100% certain.
Did
Re: (Score:2)
Carry a bottle of soapy water so you can rinse quickly if it spills on your skin.
Roundup is a soap. So you should be able to skip adding the soap to the water.
Re: (Score:2)
"This can reduce herbicide use by 95%."
That is almost commercial death to Monsanto profits.
Re: The only problem (Score:4, Insightful)
Then why go to all the trouble of suppressing and paying for false flag studies?
https://www.nytimes.com/2017/03/14/business/monsanto-roundup-safety-lawsuit.html
Re: (Score:2)
Actually Wikipedia disagrees: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/... [wikipedia.org]
Re: (Score:3)
Wikipedia is not a reliable source on *anything*, much less on anything controversial, or where someone has a monetary interest.
Wikipedia is useful, but it's sure not reliable. Documents by experts in a field are routinely rejected, and documents substantiated by some web page somewhere accepted.
Re: (Score:2)
That is why you read the article, decide for your self and/or follow the references.
Can't be so hard.
Re: (Score:2)
I didn't say all the articles were wrong, I said they weren't reliable. Some of the actually seem correct, and about a large number I have no real opinion. But that's a bit different from thinking them reliable. Reliable means I would trust them without referring to external sources to verify them.
Re: (Score:2)
Well, California does have it's problems, and Monsanto(Bayer) is indefensible.
Re: The only problem (Score:2)
It was more likely a sober cost benefit analysis between settling court cases and making it safer.
Re: The only problem (Score:2)
Roundup is approved for organic vegetables in the US and Canada. My exwife's immune system can't handle American bread as a result of her immune system going haywire. She can eat European bread fan just fine.
Thanks Monsanto
Re: (Score:2)
Roundup is approved for organic vegetables in the US and Canada.
No it isn't.
Re: (Score:2)
If your wife can't eat American bread, it's much more likely due to bromates that are banned in Europe versus Roundup that's only recently been given the could shoulder.
Re: (Score:2)
Robotic weed sprayers would use less product, I could see Monsanto bean counters objecting to that.
They can object all they want, but Monsanto doesn't get a veto. Nobody needs their permission to build and market a robot.
Also, the Roundup patent is expired, and it is now a low margin generic product.
Re: (Score:2)
That may be correct, but it's also true that medical diagnosis has gotten a lot more refined, and things that once weren't noticed now are.
OTOH, this would explain the people I've encountered who have said that they can't eat bread in the US, but when they visit France they have no problem..
Re: (Score:1)
Is that roundup doesn't cause cancer.
Nonsense. Everything [wikipedia.org] causes cancer in California.
Re: (Score:2)
I guess humor causes cancer in California as well.
Re:The only problem (Score:5, Informative)
Yeah, obviously Monsanto has nothing to hide...
https://truthout.org/articles/secret-documents-expose-monsantos-war-on-cancer-scientists/
Re:The only problem (Score:5, Insightful)
BS.
Classic tobacco science.
i.e., big business purchasing obfuscation and positive results for their product
See:
https://www.bloomberg.com/news/features/2017-07-13/does-the-world-s-top-weed-killer-cause-cancer-trump-s-epa-will-decide
> Far from settling the matter, eight of the 15 experts expressed significant concerns about the EPA’s benign view of glyphosate, and three more expressed concerns about the data.
> The EPA paper had a whack-a-mole quality to it.
> Many of the reasons cited in the paper contradicted the agency’s own carcinogenicity guidelines, multiple panelists pointed out.
> The EPA’s report on the peer review, posted on March 16, raises obfuscation to a high bureaucratic art.
Re: (Score:1, Informative)
Umm, they didn't threaten the AC, they suggested the world would be better off if they kept their inane comments to themselves. Actually rather non-violent to suggest their computer should be smashed verses all the other, actually violent, ways they could have suggested to stop their trolling.
Re: The only problem (Score:2, Informative)
Not with this smoking gun
https://www.nytimes.com/2017/03/14/business/monsanto-roundup-safety-lawsuit.html
Groundskeeper Johnny (Score:5, Funny)
groundskeeper Dewayne Johnson,
I bet his case was rock-solid.
Ranked (Score:3)
Bullshit, Horrible Reporting Everywhere On Purpuse (Score:5, Interesting)
Please stop spreading disinformation everywhere. The problem isn't glyphosate, the problem is everything else that's put into Roundup. Monsanto goes around saying glyphosate is safe and waves a bunch of valid studies in your face. They are correct. Other people go around saying roundup is dangerous and wave a bunch of valid studies in your face. They too are correct. Then everyone fights and bitches at each other. Too bad people are arguing over two different things.
Basically A is claiming the sky is blue therefore the sky is blue. B is claiming the grass is green therefore the sky is green. So A ends up laughing at B every time A goes to the bank.
Stop saying glyphosate/roundup. Stop saying "glyphosate" or "containing glyphosate". The glyphosate doesn't matter and is only a distraction from the real issue. Stop being easily manipulated sheep, you don't even notice how many people are fucking you. Words matter so use the correct ones and pay attention to the ones other people use.
Re:Bullshit, Horrible Reporting Everywhere On Purp (Score:5, Funny)
Upon careful examination, I've discovered that the parent does not include any ad hominem attacks. This is no way to win an argument on the modern web!
The post also needs more false analogy, circular reasoning, and slippery slope conclusions!
Keep trying. You'll learn one day!
Re:Bullshit, Horrible Reporting Everywhere On Purp (Score:5, Informative)
Perhaps you should name which specific chemical you're referring to, instead of saying 'everything else'. What else is in Roundup?
According to this source: [naturescountrystore.com]
ethoxylated tallowamine (surfactant)
Related organic acids of glyphosate
Excess isopropylamine (chemical used to turn the glyphosate into a more stable salt form)
Furthermore, it was found by a toxicologist 30 years ago that Roundup's surfactant was contaminated with small amounts of 1,4-Dioxane, which is known to be carcinogenic in animals. However, it's less than clearly carcinogenic to humans. [wikipedia.org] Furthermore, this is a frequent contaminant of chemicals ubiquitous in toothpaste and shampoo, which is arguably a larger problem than incidental Roundup exposure. Does roundup even still contain this contaminant? They may have improved their processes in the past 30 years, or use a different surfactant. There are other glyphosate formulations that use different surfactants/salt forms, so the only common ingredient would be glyphosate.
Re: Bullshit, Horrible Reporting Everywhere On Pur (Score:2)
Here is a citation that shows glyphosates are toxic and should go NOWHERE NEAR are food: https://www.scientificamerican... [scientificamerican.com]
Re: (Score:2)
Also, yeah sure the entire EU is smoking crack and that's why they've banned glyphosate.
How much is Monsanto paying you to astroturf, by the way? Where do
Re: (Score:2)
Re: Bullshit, Horrible Reporting Everywhere On Pur (Score:2)
More smoke and mirrors than Justin Timberlake collaborating with Snoop Dogg.
Monsanto (Score:4, Insightful)
Re: (Score:2)
There are plenty of bad things than Monsanto have done. And I'd like to see reform on GM patents.
But your story is a myth. Only a small number of farmers were sued, and Monsanto won each case because those few farmers had deliberately (re)used Monsanto seed without paying.
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/... [wikipedia.org]
Re:Monsanto (Score:5, Informative)
Since the midâ'1990s, Monsanto indicates that it has filed suit against 145 individual U.S. farmers for patent infringement and/or breach of contract in connection with its genetically engineered seed but has proceeded through trial against only eleven farmers, all of which it won
145 is not a small number, and considering that none of them actually did anything wrong it was only a killing spray of Monstanto.
Re: (Score:2)
none of them actually did anything wrong
Citation needed. Actually it's not needed as your "none" makes the statement false, more than one farmer have been proven to deliberately plant seeds protected by a Monsanto patent without the right to do so.
Re: (Score:2)
145 isn't small? Where the hell do you live? There's more then 1800 farmers in just the county I live in, and the average farm is around 150 acres in size and this is a tiny county compared to say Durham or Niagara counties, that's not even touching the areas in the green belt.
Re: (Score:2)
Yeah, 145 is not small ... we are talking here about people, I think that is quite an amount.
Sooner or later... (Score:4, Interesting)
I wonder how long it will be before we get that "perfect storm" team. Let's say, for the sake of argument, a guy with Special Forces training, a phishing expert, and somebody with a lot of money. Let's say all of them are suffering from terminal diseases everybody, including Monsanto's team of lawyers, know were caused by Monsanto products. And when they meet up at some kind of "accept your mortality" workshop, they decide no cost is too high, if the end result is the Monsanto board of directors kicking away their lives at the end of a rope.
Sooner or later, as the environment steadily degrades, we're going to get to the point where the people who made it happen, or their descendants, are going to be held accountable. No doubt there's a fun-filled action adventure movie to be made out of such a story...or maybe a few headlines.
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Honestly, I'm mildly surprised that people aren't already hunting down HMO execs and pharma bros in the streets of the United States. When you have a confluence of easy access to firearms, desperate and angry victims, a culture that appears to accept violence as a solution to personal grievances, and assholes like Shkreli, you kinda expect a few people would connect the dots.
Re: (Score:2)
Well said, my friend!
Our wonderful civil court system at work (Score:2)
Even vague and generalized research implications of cancer for a product that every homeowner uses successfully on his lawn are worth a huge amount of money, while Nicholas White, the New Yorker who, riding an elevator to work on a Friday evening, was stuck there for an entire weekend, got nothing but his legal expenses back after a 4-year struggle.
https://www.reddit.com/r/video... [reddit.com]
If only it had been a Monsanto elevator.
Even Oxygen (Score:2)
I once bought a canister of oxygen for doing some plumbing work. While hooking it up I noticed warning label stating that the contents were known to cause cancer in the state of California. If oxygen can cause cancer, than anything can cause cancer.
Follow the science not Monsanto Shills (Score:2)
The British Medical Journal, the Lancet.
https://www.thelancet.com/jour... [thelancet.com]
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Re:Ain't gonna pay out (Score:5, Insightful)
The payout wasn't to compensate the victim. It was to punish the company who suppressed information that the product was dangerous.
Re: (Score:2)
Then why is it awarded to this one victim of a widely distributed herbicide?
The courts should have awarded it to medical care, cancer research, etc - or do they think they can award this to ever cancer sufferer who used roundup?
Re: (Score:3, Insightful)
The courts should have awarded it to medical care, cancer research, etc - or do they think they can award this to ever cancer sufferer who used roundup?
It's the court. They can do whatever they want within existing legislation. That includes ordering a company pay out of 289 million to a victim for killing him while covering up information that could have saved his life.
If an individual person did the exact same thing instead of a group of people behind a corporate veil, they would be convicted of murder and spend the rest of their life in prison.
Real justice would be liquidating the company and putting all board members and executives in prison.
Re: (Score:3, Insightful)
I swear the autism level here is worse than 4chan.
Re: Ain't gonna pay out (Score:1)
https://www.nytimes.com/2017/03/14/business/monsanto-roundup-safety-lawsuit.html
Re:odd result (Score:5, Insightful)
Shouldn't it first be scientifically, or at least statistically proven, that glyphosate can cause cancer
No. The courts should be accessible to everyone, even janitors. Nobody should have to wait for permission from scientists before seeking justice. It is not the janitor's fault that no conclusive research has been done, so why should he be denied his day in court?
Re: (Score:1)
Great!
I claim ShanghaiBill causes brain cancer from reading the shite he posts! who wants to join me in a class action?
After all, we dont need proof, our 'day in court' is all that matters (that and the massive lottery payout)
Re: (Score:3)
Re: odd result (Score:3)
It has been scientifically proven through Monsantos own documents which is how they lost in court.
The EU has already banned it and here is a citation: https://www.scientificamerican... [scientificamerican.com]
Re: odd result (Score:3)
It has been scientifically proven through Monsantos own documents which is how they lost in court.
No, it hasn't.
The EU has already banned it
No, it hasn't. Last november the EU renewed the glyphosate license for 5 more years. You're just making shit up.
and here is a citation: https://www.scientificamerican... [www.scient...merican...]
That "citation" is a crappy article about some idiots who - when they couldn't prove that glyphosate itself was dangerous - instead tested one of the additives. That additive is essentially soap.
That's right, these utter morons put soap on a bunch of cells in a Petri dish and then yelled "OMG this shit kills cells in a Petr
Roundup is glyphosphate + surfactants + other ingr (Score:2)
From some reading I did two years ago, Monsanto is Very Careful to state that _glyphosphate_ has been tested for toxicity in harvested agricultural products and has at most a very weak link to cancer in some test animals.
That said, the other ingredients in the Roundup product which are intended to optimize its effects are a closely held secret, and (as of my reading two years ago) no entity, scientific or government regulatory agency has been able to study their health effects properly.
So _glyphosphate_ is
Re:The Jury (Score:4, Insightful)
That's easy-it was in California. EVERYTHING in California causes cancer. EVERYTHING. Therefore, if someone says RoundUp gave them cancer, then in California it's an automatic win, because EVERYTHING in California causes cancer.
Re: (Score:2)
It was introduced in 1974, but its popularity really took off in the 1980s. Interestingly, cancer incidence in the United States has been on a steady climb in the U.S. since about 1980 [cancer.org]. That increased incidence could entirely be a side effect of better detection, or Monsanto could be responsible for one of the bigge
You can drink a whole quart of it... (Score:2)
glyphosate is likely not something you're going to want as a seasoning on your food but...
On the contrary. According to Monsanto spokesperson Patrick Moore, https://www.youtube.com/watch?... [slashdot.org]>"You can drink a whole quart of it and it won't hurt you"
Possibly claims like this didn't help them in the lawsuit.
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