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Bayer hit with $332M judgement in Roundup cancer trial

fortune.com

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Re: Bayer hit with $332M judgement in Roundup cancer trial

#191

Post by paulryanrogers »

loeg wrote: post #54
abeppu wrote: post #17

The idea of punitive damages being awarded to a single person in a situation like this seems unjust on its own. If Roundup is responsible for this person's cancer, it's almost certainly responsible for the cancer of many other people, alive and dead. Clearly I am not a lawyer, but in cases of such a finding, I feel like there ought to be some mechanism to identify an affected class, and make proceeds benefit that cla…

Sometimes companies attempt to achieve this fair resolution using bankruptcy courts. And then people get mad about that, too.

Shaving off a part of the company as a sacrificial lamb is like trying to say "my fingertip is responsible for the murder, here take some skin shavings from the tip".

Re: Bayer hit with $332M judgement in Roundup cancer trial

#192

Post by kmmlng »

pravus wrote: post #182
iamthepieman wrote: post #53

My brother worked as a landscaper and spilled concentrated roundup all over his back and down his legs about two years ago when a backpack tank sprung a leak. About a year ago, he was diagnosed with acute lymphoblastic leukemia. 2 months ago, he passed away - less than a year after he was diagnosed. Is there a cause/effect relationship between these events? I don't know but hearing about the various trials and studie…

I'm not telling you what to do, but I really wish this kind of thinking would stop. I've spilled concentrated round-up all over my arms and legs many times because I used it regularly as weed control all over my property in Texas. I've also been regularly exposed to all sorts of noxious chemicals like acetone, gasoline, diesel, various alcohols, and many different organic compounds in general. On bare skin (solvents…

This stuff is all about risk. If two people add their personal experiences, we have two data points. What are we supposed to do with that? It's not enough to quantify risk.

You can do everything wrong and be completely fine or you can do a single thing wrong and suffer the consequences immediately. Those are the two extremes and then there will be a bunch of data points in between those extremes. What you want to pay attention to are averages. How likely is it that I suffer negative consequences from this? If I do, what is the magnitude of the negative effect going to be on average?

Re: Bayer hit with $332M judgement in Roundup cancer trial

#193

Post by bluGill »

ftrobro wrote: post #181
cyberax wrote: post #117

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> pesticide use is lower... It's not. Europe uses somewhat lower amount of pesticides because it has more land that regularly freezes which helps to control insects. When corrected for that, Europe uses more pesticides for similar climates. > yields are higher than in the US. They aren't, when corrected for the land area.

What do you mean by "corrected for the land area"? According to this study, in the period 2016-2020 wheat yields per acre were more than twice as high in Germany than in North Dakota or Kansas. https://ag.purdue.edu/commercialag/home/resource/2022/05/int...

North Dakota and Kansas are deserts or near desert. Germany gets 2 to 7 times more rain per year (depending on which part of Germany you look at)

Re: Bayer hit with $332M judgement in Roundup cancer trial

#194

Post by bluGill »

TaylorAlexander wrote: post #52
dade_ wrote: post #44

The most dangerous surface in a farm is the farmer’s hat I was told. So they wear the hat in the sun, tilling the fields, but the reason the hat is dangerous is from spraying the fields. Pesticides and herbicides are downright scary chemicals, and we genetically modify crops to improve tolerance of these chemicals. And that is when I went all GMO free, not because I am worried about eating grain that has modified gen…

People tell me "GMO food is perfectly safe" and they do not seem to understand that in practice they genetically modify the food so they can dump glyphosate on it and that's what I want to avoid eating!

What makes you think non GMO is any safer? GMO seeds are studied to confirm safety, everything else is not studied at all. Random mutations happen all the time in non GMO food, but nobody checks if it is safe. Thus your worse case for GMO is no different than any other food '

Re: Bayer hit with $332M judgement in Roundup cancer trial

#195

Post by oooyay »

reducesuffering wrote: post #163
oooyay wrote: post #81

Earlier quoted context omitted.

According to the FDA they genetically modify plants to dump less pesticides on them and to be cheaper: https://www.fda.gov/food/agricultural-biotechnology/why-do-f...

All that says is "Farmers can use less spray pesticides when they plant GMO crops. From a paper: "On whether RR soybean systems reduce pesticide use and increase grower profits, our analysis shows that – • RR soybean systems are largely dependent on herbicides and hence are not likely to reduce herbicide use or reliance. Claims otherwise are based on incomplete information or analytically flawed comparisons that do n…

There's meta analysis that shows on average the statement is true: https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pmc/articles/PMC4218791/ even in general

Re: Bayer hit with $332M judgement in Roundup cancer trial

#196

Post by bluGill »

jjoonathan wrote: post #80
TaylorAlexander wrote: post #52

Earlier quoted context omitted.

People tell me "GMO food is perfectly safe" and they do not seem to understand that in practice they genetically modify the food so they can dump glyphosate on it and that's what I want to avoid eating!

How does glyphosate compare to the usual alternatives?

Well the main alternative was cultivation, that is dragging a steal hoe threw the ground. This releases a lot of co2, both from burning fuel and faster decomposition of organic matter and so is a factor in global warming. That hoe also destoryes the soil and leads to topsoil loss. Glyphosate allows modern farm to leave the soil alone and that builds more top soil.

Re: Bayer hit with $332M judgement in Roundup cancer trial

#197

Post by bluGill »

tails4e wrote: post #111
dade_ wrote: post #44

The most dangerous surface in a farm is the farmer’s hat I was told. So they wear the hat in the sun, tilling the fields, but the reason the hat is dangerous is from spraying the fields. Pesticides and herbicides are downright scary chemicals, and we genetically modify crops to improve tolerance of these chemicals. And that is when I went all GMO free, not because I am worried about eating grain that has modified gen…

Shit. I remember clearly spraying roundup out of a backpack sprayer on a calm day, when a stray gust of wind blew some of the spray back up and into my face. I often wonder if I inadvertently sealed my fate despite that level of exposure being so brief. It was about 5 years ago,so far so good.

Courts are not judges of science. Roundup is well studied in science and the overwhelming majority find it is harmless to humans.

Re: Bayer hit with $332M judgement in Roundup cancer trial

#198

Post by bigbillheck »

dgroshev wrote: post #55
dade_ wrote: post #44

The most dangerous surface in a farm is the farmer’s hat I was told. So they wear the hat in the sun, tilling the fields, but the reason the hat is dangerous is from spraying the fields. Pesticides and herbicides are downright scary chemicals, and we genetically modify crops to improve tolerance of these chemicals. And that is when I went all GMO free, not because I am worried about eating grain that has modified gen…

"Chemicals killing the crop" aren't inherently dangerous to your body, that's just chemophobia. Best quality artisanal chocolate can easily kill your cat. Nicotine kills bugs and is benign in humans. Belladonna would kill you, but a goat can munch on it without much trouble. Lots of stuff is lethal to some species and harmless to others, "this chemical is so bad it kills plants" is as rational as "chocolate is so bad…

> Nicotine ... benign in humans

Not 100% sure I agree with that: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Nicotine_poisoning

Re: Bayer hit with $332M judgement in Roundup cancer trial

#199

Post by bluGill »

reducesuffering wrote: post #184
dehrmann wrote: post #171

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> Amongst mammals, glyphosate is considered to have "low to very low toxicity". The LD50 of glyphosate is 5,000 mg/kg for rats, 10,000 mg/kg in mice and 3,530 mg/kg in goats. https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Glyphosate I wouldn't just go drink it for fun, but for what it is, it's surprisingly safe.

If you wouldn’t drink a cup for fun, then do you know how many aggregate cups you’re getting per month from all the food you eat? They didn’t poof into existence. Every part of your food is from glysophate sprayed crops and animals that have food-chained them.

It is in food in part per billion quantities. You don't get a cup over you lifetime.

Re: Bayer hit with $332M judgement in Roundup cancer trial

#200

Post by bigbillheck »

oooyay wrote: post #75
sharts wrote: post #64

Earlier quoted context omitted.

And yet, eating food that has spoiled contains chemicals that are inherently dangerous to your body causing food-poisoning. That people would prefer NOT to believe those with vested interest in profiting from selling things exposed to chemicals isn't an invalid concern.

Food poisoning is caused by viruses and bacteria. As another poster pointed out, a lot of GMO crops are altered in such a way that they don't need as many pesticides. Non-GMO often need more pesticides and the GMO label has nothing to do with pesticides - just genetic modification. If you don't trust me, just ask the FDA: https://www.fda.gov/food/agricultural-biotechnology/why-do-f...

> Food poisoning is caused by viruses and bacteria.

I've got plenty of E.coli in my gut already, the risk in food poisoning is not that I'll get a few more, it's that I'll get a few more that also produce shigatoxin.

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