(New York) The Monsanto group, a subsidiary of the German giant Bayer, was ordered Monday in the United States to pay $857 million in damages to student and parent volunteers at a school in Washington state, exposed to PCBs (polychlorinated biphenyls), so-called “eternal” pollutants.
In a reaction sent to AFP, Monsanto indicated its desire to appeal this decision, as it had done in other cases relating to the same school, the Sky Valley Education Center, in Monroe.
Five former students and two former parents of students had filed a lawsuit in King’s County, a jurisdiction that includes Seattle, claiming that their exposure to PCBs contained in lighting had caused them health problems.
Several decisions have already been rendered concerning other teachers, students and parents of the same school, with several hundred million dollars in compensation at stake.
Monsanto has, on several occasions, recalled having ceased the production of these PCBs, intended to prevent the risk of fire, since 1977, i.e. before their ban by the American government in 1979.
The group “never warned anyone that (the PCBs) would last longer than the facilities in which they were installed,” said Felix Luna, lawyer for the seven plaintiffs, during his oral argument.
“They never warned that when they enter the body, they stay there for life, that they are neurotoxic, […] a danger,” he continued, according to the transcript of the debates.
The agrochemical group faces other legal actions linked to the effects of PCB.
In the reaction sent to AFP, Monsanto recalled having already been exonerated in several cases.
Bought in 2018 by Bayer for $63 billion, the company has also been ordered several times to compensate people who were in contact with the controversial weedkiller Roundup, based on glyphosate.
In mid-November, a Jefferson City, Missouri, court jury awarded Monsanto $1.5 billion in damages for three Americans who blamed their non-Hodgkin’s lymphoma on years of use. Roundup.
The group also appealed this conviction.
