Monsanto gets successfully sued for 289 million dollars

https://www.cnn.com/2018/08/10/health/monsanto-johnson-trial-verdict/index.html

Holy crap. Gentlemen got Hodgkins lymphoma and blamed it on the weedkiller round up that is made by Monsanto.

There's no definitive study showing that the chemicals in it cause cancer, though some studies have shown links but others have shown no links. Per the WHO, there is limited evidence of caricnogencity in humans for non-Hodgkins lymphoma. Per monsanto, more than 800 studies, the US EPA, and the NIH say it is safe.

Per the CNN articles, "While it's impossible to prove Roundup caused Johnson's terminal illness, it's also impossible not to prove it". That's a low bar. I think I'm going to sue monsanto because my IQ is not 300. It's impossible to prove that they are the reason for that, but it's also impossible not to prove it.

This is just the first leg, it will take years before a final verdict will come.

But California is a crazy state. and what a crazy case,

Well, if you can't punish Monsanto for the terrible shit we can prove they did, I guess getting them for the terrible shit you can't prove they did is almost as good...

So... I assume Monsanto has appealed already. How long can we expect this to drag on?

It's nigh impossible to say 'X event' or 'X chemical' gave a specific person cancer, so this is rather shocking to me given the price tag as well. What's more probably is to say that 'X chemical' increases cancer risk if exposed to it, which has more bearing on class action suits and not individual ones.

I haven't looked much into it but I'd need to see what studies they used to link (if any).

Probably another 5-10 years

Often it is difficult, but not impossible.

You know the material that is sometimes used on watches. It will absorb light during the day and can emit some light when it is dark? That used to be radioactive. Now those who worked with that material, applying it where it was supposed to be. Many of them developed very specific cancers. A direct consequence of their work.

That would be radium. Radioactive material is a bit different since the nature of damage to human is a more clear cut. I'm not saying that it didn't cause it, I'm simply speculating on something I haven't read too much into at this point.

The burden of proof in civil cases is low. I'd be interested to see what shifted the balance for the jury.

It wasn't that a century ago.

News to me that in US they were called the radium girls.

However in the case that TC talks about. Study the rate of said disease, compare national average with the average for those who worked with potential carcinogen. If they are the same, it is most likely not carcinogen. If they are very different, it is a different story.

I used to live near a giant farmland in Tracy, CA just down the block. Would always walk there to get to school and see that crap being sprayed.

Few years later.... Diagnosed with Acute Lymphoblastic Leukemia--the first in my family. Might just be coincidence but a study that proves it would give me a peace of mind.

Luckily, I survived it with little damages in cost for my treatment (wonderful county insurance). I just need to bare the post-chemo side effects, such as necrosis of my joints.

Isn't it Monsanto's job to make sure they use chemicals of which they are reasonably certain that it won't make people ill when people use it according to instruction? This chemical seems a little iffy?

I think what may have had effect on the jury is the amount of other people with similar cases.

On my news channel they said it was much more 50/50 whether the chemical was harmful rather than 800-something to a couple. Not that I trust my news channel that much.

They have most likely tested it a lot, however the tests they run are more or less limited to how much we know about cancer and what causes it. Remember it took ages before we realised radiation could cause cancer. Smoking was promoted as healthy.

Granted you have some easier tests, like have two colonies of bacteria, both given a specific mutation(s) and see if the mutation rate back to normal is different for the two colonies. One being exposed to the chemical they wish to test, the other being a control group.

@horgen: Hmm yes. I cannot say with what little we know, whether Monsanto was wrong or right to use those chemicals.

Companies aren't interested in that........they're interested in profit. Which is why trump's roll back of protections is bad for the environment and ALL life forms including humans.

I'd be more agreeable with that verdict if they had tested the chemical and found serious concerns that they hid. That would be malfeasance imo. The NFL for instance, sat on all that CTE data. Some drug companies have knowingly hid data, etc.

In this case, it looks like the studies are conflicting at best. The EPA has not declared it to be a danger and multiple scientific studies have not shown a casual link. However, the WHO does believe it to be a risk and some studies suggest one of the components could be carcinogenic.

My biggest concern in this case is that the proof/evidence is extremely poor. Cancer is the second leading cause of death in the US and lymphoma is not a rare cancer. There are thousands of different factors that can contribute. A few exposures to roundup seem unlikely, otherwise we'd probably have an epidemic of lymphoma in this country given its wide spread use.

Lots of substances can be found to be carcinogenic or harmful, but that often is completely dependent on the context in which they are used. Take for example cigarette smoking. We know for a fact that smoking has an extremely strong link to lung cancer. This is not "probable" or maybe, but a definitive link. If you smoke your entire life and get lung cancer, chances are that the cigarettes either caused or significantly contributed to you getting cancer. However, if you smoked just 12 cigarettes your entire life and got lung cancer, what now? Probably very unlikely that they caused the cancer. Many substances may have some carcinogenicity but they typically require large doses and sustained exposures to significantly increase your risk. There are also other studies that don't necessarily relate to humans. Saccharin was long thought to cause cancer because it did in lab rats. But the doses they received were not comparable to what humans would and are livers are better at clearing chemicals than rats. So I think that it's no longer blacklisted.