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J&J Reaches Sweeping Talc Deal That Could End Decade of Litigation
Johnson & Johnson said on Monday it would pay an estimated $5.5 billion to resolve tens of thousands of lawsuits alleging its baby powder and other talc products cause ovarian cancer, in a landmark deal that could end a contentious legal battle that has dogged the company for a decade.
J&J said the settlement covers about 76,000 claims, including ones consolidated in federal court in New Jersey, and related cases in state court, representing nearly all of the remaining talc claims against the company. J&J previously settled most of the cases alleging that its talc contained asbestos and caused mesothelioma.
Plaintiffs’ law firms confirmed the deal on Monday, saying it was a good resolution after a decade-long court battle. The deal must be accepted by 95% of the ovarian cancer claimants in state or federal court before it becomes final. J&J’s vice president of litigation, Erik Haas, said the claims were “meritless” and that the company was willing to settle in order to get closure.
Glyphosate, Common Pesticides Damage Human DNA at Low Doses
Several common pesticides, including the controversial herbicide glyphosate, cause genetic damage to people’s cells at very low exposure levels, according to a new study. Such cellular changes, often referred to as “genotoxicity,” are linked to cancer. The findings suggest that current pesticide testing and regulation are not fully capturing how pesticides may harm people.
The new study, published in the Annals of Global Health journal, tested 10 pesticides that people are exposed to and found that eight damaged or altered the DNA in human cells. For the weedkiller glyphosate, the researchers saw cell damage at the lowest levels tested, suggesting that there is almost no safe level of human exposure.
It was the first time several of the pesticides were tested for impacts on DNA and the first study to confirm certain mixtures of the pesticides were toxic to cells as well. A mixture of glyphosate, the insecticide acetamiprid and the fungicide fluopyram, for example, damaged cells at the lowest dose tested.
In a ‘Toxic Terrain,’ Journalism Exposes Iowa’s Farm Pollution Problem
Real change occurs in America when civic pressures from outside the centers of influence force insiders to retreat. A compelling example of that type of systemic change is now unfolding in Iowa. Severe water contamination from crop and livestock production linked to rising high rates of cancer has developed into a key election year issue in Iowa, one of the country’s most important farm states.
Never before has industrial agriculture and its mammoth toxic discharges been subject in Iowa or any other state to such intense public scrutiny and condemnation.
One critical reason for that is environmental journalism, including the penetrating reporting in Toxic Terrain, a two-year project by The New Lede and Circle of Blue.
The articles were also widely republished by regional and national news organizations. In 28 deeply reported articles, Toxic Terrain played a huge role in elevating Iowa’s worst-in-the-nation water contamination and its nation-leading cancer rate to public examination.
Our work to fully explore the scandal of farm pollution and its health consequences, and our publishing partners in addition to Circle of Blue – Investigate Midwest, MinnPost, Iowa Capital Dispatch, The Guardian – also proved the influence of non-profit environmental journalism and collaboration in advancing the public interest.
US Environmental Groups Urge EPA to Reject New PFAS to Cool Datacenters
A coalition of 17 environmental groups is demanding the Environmental Protection Agency reject a new Pfas that chemical giant Chemours is attempting to fast-track for approval for use in cooling datacenters, and would almost certainly pollute regions around the facilities.
In formal comments submitted to the agency, the groups accuse Chemours of using bad science to downplay the chemical’s toxicity and climate risks. Approving Chemours’ application as it is would violate the law, the Earthjustice legal non-profit, a lead author of the comments, wrote.
Big tech has faced fierce opposition from across the political spectrum in communities where it plans to build datacenters, in part because some types of the facilities require huge quantities of water to cool. Datacenter developers, like Google, have touted its two-phase cooling systems as an alternative that uses far less water, but few know that those typically use Pfas “forever chemical” gas instead of water.
