The manufacturer of a popular weedkiller is asking the Supreme Court to determine whether federal law should invalidate thousands of lawsuits that claim the company has a duty to warn about health risks of the product.
Biotechnology company Bayer in a petition filed Friday argued that federal law prevents it from adding a label to Monsanto’s Roundup product line warning customers of alleged cancer risks of its active ingredient, glyphosate.
Bayer acquired Monsanto in 2018, and the company has been inundated with what it said were “unfounded” legal challenges across the country from customers alleging the weedkiller was responsible for their cancers.
Lawsuits have already forced the company to remove glyphosate from its consumer version of Roundup, but “the continuing overhang of these lawsuits threatens Monsanto’s ability to continue to supply glyphosate to farmers who need it to remain world leaders in food production,” the company told the court in its petition.
