Johnson & Johnson is to pay PLN 3.5 billion to the family of those who died of cancer. Company: junk science
A jury in Los Angeles, USA, ordered Johnson & Johnson (J&J) to pay $966 million. the family of a woman who died of mesothelioma.
The family of Mae Moore, a California resident who died in 2021 at the age of 88, sued the company that year, claiming that J&J talcum powder baby powder contained asbestos fibers, which caused a rare cancer the woman suffered from.
Mesothelioma is a malignant tumor most often located in the pleura. The main risk factors for its formation include exposure to asbestos.
A jury this week ordered Johnson & Johnson to pay $16 million. compensatory damages and $950 million. punitive damages, according to court documents cited by CNN.
Johnson & Johnson is to pay $966 million. from the family who died of cancer. Company: junk science
The sentence may be reduced on appeal because the U.S. Supreme Court has ruled that punitive damages should generally be no greater than nine times compensatory damages.
Erik Haas, global vice president of litigation at J&J, said in a statement that the company plans to immediately appeal the ruling, calling it “egregious and unconstitutional.”
“The plaintiffs' attorneys in the Moore case based their arguments on 'junk science' that should never have been presented to a jury,” Haas said, as quoted by CNN.
Lawsuits poured in. Johnson & Johnson: our products are safe
The company claims its products are safe, do not contain asbestos and do not cause cancer. In 2020, J&J stopped selling talc-based baby powder in the United States, switching to a cornstarch-based product.
J&J faces lawsuits from more than 67,000 plaintiffs who say they were diagnosed with cancer after using baby powder and other talcum powder products, according to court documents. The number of lawsuits alleging that talcum powder caused mesothelioma is a small subset of these cases. The vast majority involve ovarian cancer.
The company has already settled some of these claims, but has not settled nationwide, and many mesothelioma lawsuits have been brought to state courts in recent months.
J&J lost several significant mesothelioma cases last year, but the latest one is among the biggest. The company has also won several mesothelioma lawsuits, including last week in South Carolina, where a jury ruled that J&J was not liable.
The company was able to reduce some damages on appeal, including in one case in Oregon in which a state judge granted J&J's request to set aside a $260 million judgment. and conducting a new process.
Source: CNN
