Bayer Ag, who bought Monsanto in 2018, has agreed to pay $10 billion over claims their product Roundup causes cancer. Over 100,000 clients had been stricken with cancer because of prolong use of this product and will be receiving the money.
According to Fierce, this is the single largest settlement in pharma history. Bayer will also set aside $1.25 billion to cover any future Roundup claims, which will be handled as part of a class negotiation. Bayer will not admit any wrongdoing as part of its settlement deal.
Roundup’s main ingredient is glyphosate which is widely used worldwide. Back in 2015, the International Agency for Research on Cancer labeled the herbicide as “probably carcinogenic.” And in 2017, the California Office of Environmental Health Hazard Assessment listed glyphosate as a cancer-causing chemical.
According to EWG, glyphosate is mostly applied to corn, soybean, and wheat crops, but is increasingly sprayed just before harvest on oats, chickpeas, and other crops as a drying agent, or desiccant, to speed the harvest. The pre-harvest use is why many oat-based cereals are contaminated with glyphosate.
“Even as we celebrate and congratulate those who made this day possible, millions of people are being exposed to glyphosate through the food they eat, working as groundskeepers or farmworkers, or gardening at home. Bayer-Monsanto must be held accountable beyond today’s settlement. The Food and Drug Administration must immediately eliminate its use as a pre-harvest desiccant, and the Environmental Protection Agency must ban all home uses. That is the only way to assure future generations of Americans do not get sick or die from exposure to this cancer-causing chemical,” says EWG President Ken Cook.
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