Long-term spraying every spring, amateur gardeners also get lymph cancer, mistakenly believe Monsanto advertisement: Jia Lin Sai is safer than salt bar

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Germany's Bayer, which set its sights on Monsanto in 2015, spent $63 billion last year-equivalent to the annual budget of Taiwan's central government-to become the world's largest agrochemical company. But Monsanto is like a bride from hell, fraught with lawsuits. Less than a year after the marriage, Bayer's share price almost halved, leaving it with a market capitalization of only about $52 billion, less than the amount paid for Monsanto at the time.

Two months after Bayer AG's acquisition of Monsanto, the San Francisco Superior Court ruled in 2018 that Monsanto's production of herbicides containing glyphosate (Roundup) and related products must be responsible for non-Hodgkin's lymphoma (non-Hodgkin lymphoma) of Johnson, the campus administrator of California. Although the fine was reduced to $78 million after the appeal, the court upheld the decision that it caused cancer in the spring.

Six months later, Bayer suffered another defeat in court. At the end of March, a federal court in San Francisco ruled that Gypsy caused 70-year-old Edwin Hardeman to develop non-Hodgkin's lymphoma, and Bayer had to pay $80 million in damages. Unlike Johnson, who needs to spray herbicides professionally, Hardman has been taking care of his garden every spring since 1986, once a month, for three to four hours at a time, spraying more than 20, 000 liters in 28 years.

Johnson was fully armed when he sprinkled herbicides, but it was still hard to escape the accident that the pipeline fell off and spilled all over his body. Hardman believes that Monsanto's advertisement claiming that Garnet is harmless, and that spray bottles like detergents are sold on the shelves of home-renovated tool chains, and that he usually sprays herbicides without any protective clothing or masks, and was diagnosed with Hodgkin's lymphoma in 2015. He said in court that he would not use the product to weed if he knew that gardener would cause cancer, even if the weeds in the garden were annoying.

Edwin Hardem (Picture Source / cc)

Mistakenly believe Monsanto advertisement: Jiaposai is safer than salt

Many Americans, like Hardman, listened to what Monsanto said in the 1990s, believing that the full name of Carthamol, which is isopropylamine salt, is safer than salt and is not toxic to mammals, birds and fish. One advertisement every spring even says that garnet can be used in places where children and pets play, and depicts a person lying on the ground with a puppy beside him.

Bayer said it would appeal against the Hardman case, but it could not stop the flood of lawsuits. Seemingly harmless, global bestsellers look like serial killers, and more than 11000 Americans accuse them of causing cancer every spring. The case of Mr. and Mrs. Pilliod, who also suffer from non-Hodgkin's lymphoma, began in Alameda, California, in early April.

Doctors can tell patients to tolerate side effects, but drugs can save lives. The same logic is hard to apply to pesticides, says Mark Lanier, one of the lawyers representing the victims of Garrett. Agrochemical companies can't convince users: "put up with non-Hodgkin's lymphoma, but you don't have to work so hard to weed."

(the following videos can be viewed in 50 seconds.)

Bayer persuaded the judge to adopt a two-stage trial to ensure that public opinion could not manipulate the jury

Hardman is the second Garrett case, but the first to be heard in federal court, which is indicative and will predict the course of about 1200 lawsuits at the same level in the future. The federal court requires more stringent inference of evidence, and the plaintiff bears a heavier burden of proof.

Before the trial of Johnson last year, Monsanto ruled out 27 "biased" jury members to ensure a fair and objective trial. But after losing the case, Monsanto still blamed the jury for being "emotional and unable to talk about science."

Bayer criticized the jury for being unprofessional, but also believed that Monsanto's team of lawyers lacked experience to lose the battle.

When he went to court again, Bayer personally carried out the operation, demanding that the Hardman case be divided into two stages: the first stage focused on the scientific evidence of cancer every spring, and then entered the second stage after determining the causal relationship to determine whether Monsanto, who was in charge of production, should be held responsible. "the two-stage trial allows Bayer to focus strongly on scientific data that prove product safety," Werner Baumann, Bayer's chief executive, said confidently before the trial. But Hardman's lawyer for the plaintiff protested.

The judge asked the lawyer not to advocate Monsanto's misdeeds, but Bayer still lost the case.

The second-stage trial is indeed an exception. However, the presiding judge, Vince Chhabria, held that discussing Monsanto's deviant behavior of influencing regulators and manipulating public opinion would blur the focus of scientific argument and adopted a two-stage trial.

At the first stage of the trial, counsel for the plaintiff was not allowed to mention Monsanto's wrongdoing. But for describing Hardman's pain after suffering from cancer, the judge determined that it was a deliberate violation, aroused the sympathy of the jury, fined the lawyer $500, and warned that if he did so again, Hardman's case would be dismissed and there would be no way for him to complain.

The procedure was divided into two stages, and the jury almost reached a state of mind, but Bayer still lost the case. in the first stage, it was ruled that Garasek would cause cancer, and then in the second stage, the jury unanimously ruled that Bayer must compensate Hardman 80 million US dollars.

Bayer is good at dealing with lawsuits and is not afraid of Monsanto litigation.

There is a zero distance between Monsanto and evil. In addition to Garnet, Agent Orange (orange agent) produced during the Vietnam War, polychlorinated biphenyls (PCBs) that caused environmental pollution and residents, and GM crops have all been criticized. But Bayer policy makers believe that a company cannot be judged by social perception alone. And around 2015, big agrochemical companies around the world acted frequently, with DuPont merging with Dow and ChemChina buying Switzerland's Syngenda. Bayer is worried that if it does not take the initiative, it will become the target of mergers and acquisitions.

Before Bayer completed the merger in 2018, Monsanto got into trouble again. In 2015, the International Cancer Research Institute (IARC), which is affiliated with the World Health Organization (WHO), listed Gypsy as a level 2A most likely to cause cancer in humans, and non-Hodgkin's lymphoma patients and their families have been reported one after another. Bayer is still determined to buy Monsanto, not on the spur of the moment, but to secure its market position on the one hand, and to think that it is first-class in risk management and can handle litigation on the other.

Founded in 1863, Bayer gained a foothold in the market with aspirin in 1899 and has fought several difficult lawsuits in the United States over the past 156 years. Bayer's cholesterol-lowering Lipin membrane ingot (Baycol or Lipobay) was reported to have caused rhabdomyolysis in 2002, resulting in more than 30 deaths, resulting in about 15000 complaints.

At that time, Bayer's share price plummeted to $10 a share, the bank refused to extend the term of the loan, and analysts estimated that the lawsuit would cost more than $10 billion.

Bayer's two-handed strategy, reconciling on the one hand and accompanying the prosecution to the end on the other.

The century-old German pharmaceutical company stood still in the face of danger and worked out a litigation strategy that was later emulated by many multinational companies: to settle with victims who made reasonable injury claims, and then to fight back mercilessly, albeit for years, in cases where the evidence was weak and Bayer was confident of winning.

Bayer's divide-and-conquer strategy worked, settling with more than 3, 000 victims of cholesterol-lowering drugs and paying a total of $1.2 billion, well below market expectations. After Bayer won several lawsuits, some people withdrew their claims.

Jiaposai has gone from a cash cow to a hot potato, but it is not the only thorny lawsuit in Bayer's hands. About 25000 people sued Bayer's anticoagulant Xarelto for bleeding or even death, about 17000 for Essure and nearly 3, 000 for another device, Mirena.

After losing two consecutive battles in the Garrett case, the latest one was heard in federal court, and Bayer said it would consider Judge Chabria's proposal to settle with the victims.

The victim demanded that the product should be marked with cancer risk, which Bayer refused.

After the reconciliation, although the victims can receive financial compensation, their lost health and departed families will never come back. Judging from the precedent, Bayer will not admit his mistake even if he spends money to settle. Despite paying more than $1 billion for the cholesterol-lowering drug Liping film ingots, Bayer insists that it has done its duty to inform and warn of side effects when selling its products. Similarly, Bayer still says that Jiaposai is a pioneering work in modern agriculture, allowing farmers to deal with weeds in a cheap and safe way.

Like an addict, many farmers really can't get rid of the cheap and easy-to-use Jiaposai. Despite concerns about cancer and other health risks, abandoning it means it will be more expensive and labor-intensive to take care of crops, and it may be difficult to survive in a highly competitive market after raising costs.

Hardman asked that at least the risk of cancer be marked on products containing garnet, but Bayer still refused. Continuing the style of responding to drug damage, Bayer believes that drugs inevitably have side effects.

Bayer could not hide his disappointment at losing two lawsuits in a row and repeated the same statement: the latest ruling will not change more than 40 years of extensive scientific research and the conclusion that many authorities around the world have concluded that Gaposet does not cause cancer. Brian Stekloff, a lawyer representing Bayer, backed up the banner of science. "Monsanto's scientific research is consistent and in line with the scientific rules of the rest of the world." He also questioned the jury's judgment. "this should not be a trial about the popularity of a company."

But Bayer still has no regrets. In its 155-year history, Monsanto's Gaposai problem is like a brief whirlpool. The German chemical giant has faced more serious drug damage lawsuits in the United States and has developed a set of litigation responses, believing that with the support of strong capital, science and justice are on their side.

Monsanto deliberately concealed the cancer risk of Garrette for 40 years. The court awarded NT $9 billion in the Johnson & Johnson case, and 4, 000 Americans waited to go to court.

Monsanto documents are exposed! Taiwan is also the object of courting │ to bribe experts to name it, whitewashing the cancer risk of Garnet.

Pesticide consumption in Taiwan has reached a 17-year high! The US court ordered Garrette to pay sky-high compensation and ban Taosong for the protection of babies. Will Taiwan follow suit?

Sales of herbicides in Taiwan hit a record high! The annual sales are 2.6 billion yuan, and the consumption per unit area is among the best in the world.

There is no excessive amount of ─ herbicide in Cuncao, which impacts the soil ecology and increases the risk of cancer.

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