Bayer AG recently announced it would pay $10.5 billion to settle tens of thousands of lawsuits claiming Roundup weed killer causes cancer. After the checks clear, Roundup will remain on the market. Millions of consumers and farmers will continue using the product because, according to the Environmental Protection Agency and regulators around the world, Roundup doesn’t cause cancer.
The only reason Bayer is paying anybody anything is a flawed U.S. tort system that left the company little choice. Plaintiffs’ lawyers spent tens of millions of dollars on a years-long campaign to recruit clients for lawsuits based upon the questionable scientific opinions of paid experts. Some of the experts only began linking Roundup to cancer shortly before they started appearing in court. Judges allowed those experts to testify in front of non-scientist jurors who were understandably sympathetic toward plaintiffs suffering from a potentially fatal disease. Those jurors overlooked -- or in some cases were never told -- that government experts consider Roundup to be safe.
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