FRANKFURT, Aug 16 (Reuters) – Bayer, seeking to contain billions of dollars in legal costs, filed an appeal with the U.S. Supreme Court to reverse an appeals court ruling in favor of a plaintiff who indicted the group. German that his glyphosate-based herbicides caused cancer.
Last week, the drug and pesticide maker lost a third appeal in the United States against verdicts that upheld consumers of the Roundup herbicide brand and awarded them tens of millions of dollars in compensation each. The last legal recourse for Bayer now remains in the Supreme Court.
Bayer on Monday asked the highest court to review one of the rulings issued by the Federal Court of Appeals for the Ninth Circuit, which was in favor of California resident and Roundup user Edwin Hardeman, the German company said in a statement.
The manufacturer of aspirin and birth control pills Yasmin has repeatedly argued that claims that glyphosate-based Roundup causes cancer run counter to concrete scientific facts and that the product has received clearance from the federal environmental regulator.
“The errors of the Ninth Circuit ruling imply that a company can be severely punished for marketing a product without a cancer warning when the near-universal scientific and regulatory consensus is that the product does not cause cancer, and the responsible federal agency has banned such a warning. “said the company.
Roundup-related lawsuits have dogged the company since it acquired the brand as part of its $ 63 billion purchase of agricultural seeds and pesticide maker Monsanto in 2018.
Bayer initially settled with the plaintiffs last year, but failed to win court approval in a separate case on how to handle future Roundup cases as it intended to keep the product on the market.
Last month, Bayer needed an additional $ 4.5 billion litigation provision to cover any unfavorable rulings from the US Supreme Court. The figure was added to the 11.6 billion dollars that the firm had already set aside for settlements and lawsuits on the matter.
(Report by Ludwig Burger. Edited in Spanish by Marion Giraldo)
