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3M heads to trial in ‘existential’ $143B forever-chemicals litigation

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Re: 3M heads to trial in ‘existential’ $143B forever-chemicals litigation

#161

Post by notatoad »

rdli wrote: post #84
Sytten wrote: post #14

Earlier quoted context omitted.

They are used in all kinds of products that I personaly use everyday from pans to dental floss. And the replacements are not better, they just dont have studies yet that prove they are toxic...

We've worked to reduce plastics & chemicals in our house. Some things we do: * We use silk dental floss (we use Radius) * We use glass storage containers instead of Tupperware * For cooking, we use All-Clad. * If a recipe calls for non-stick (e.g., pancakes) I use a braiser from Le Creuset, which works reasonably well. (Edited: formatting)

A great alternative to a non-stick pan is a stainless steel pan with a sheet of parchment paper in it

Re: 3M heads to trial in ‘existential’ $143B forever-chemicals litigation

#162

Post by pr0zac »

jquast wrote: post #45
hackernewds wrote: post #22

Earlier quoted context omitted.

But it will set a mighty example for others

Genuinely curious, would any money be extracted from the personal accounts of any executive employee that made these decisions, current or past, from any of these thousands of lawsuits? Unless the decision-making folks have their personal wealth destroyed, they really haven’t anything to lose. I would expect the worst-case scenario is that their stock portfolios will need to be adjusted, by tax-loss harvesting their…

Considering Purdue Pharma, the Sackler family has so far had to pay out $10.5 billion (estimates of their net worth including those settlements have it dropping $8b during this time period) and despite trying quite hard have not managed to gain legal immunity or protection regarding civil and criminal liability. That means they'll very likely be hit with more lawsuits going forward and possibly even criminal charges.

Looking at it, I think thats pretty good and hope the possibility for future lawsuits means they continue to pay, but knowing that case is an unusual outlier and that none of the other people involved like the CEO or other executives have had any consequences makes it feel a little underwhelming.

I'm glad government is going after bad companies more and I hope they continue, but it does seem like our legal system is just not equipped to correctly hold people responsible in these cases.

Re: 3M heads to trial in ‘existential’ $143B forever-chemicals litigation

#163

Post by baxtr »

pcurve wrote: post #9

The chemicals in question are of type PFAS and believe it or not, they're still legal to use today, though they're being phased out and banned in a few years. The problem is 3M scientists have know toxicity to human and have withheld the information to the public and regulators. Since 1970s.

Is it possible to determine a number of casualties through the withholding of information? I vaguely remember that there was number of induced deaths in the VW scandal.

Re: 3M heads to trial in ‘existential’ $143B forever-chemicals litigation

#164

Post by cyberax »

tomxor wrote: post #83
Sytten wrote: post #14

Earlier quoted context omitted.

They are used in all kinds of products that I personaly use everyday from pans to dental floss. And the replacements are not better, they just dont have studies yet that prove they are toxic...

You are referring to Teflon, there's some confusion with the differences in toxicity between the chemical used in the final products (today at least) and the chemical used in manufacturing. Although the human impact is only subtly different (that in theory it makes no personal difference whether or not you buy such products, which is a worse position to be in than it sounds)... As a non-chemist I don't claim to have…

The difference between teflon and PFAS is in the hydrophilic "head".

Basically, teflon consists just of long chains of carbon atoms saturated with fluorine. They are extremely chemically resistant, and they appear to be biologically inert. Even if you heat the teflon past its decomposition temperature, you simply get pieces of the hydrocarbon chain as a result. They are nasty, but they are not persistent pollutants.

PFAS are different. They also consist of a chain of carbons with fluorine atoms attached to them. But they also have a hydrophilic "head" attached to them at the beginning of the chain. This hydrophilic head allows PFAS to function as surfactants, and it also makes them biologically active. The body can't do anything with the hydrocarbons saturated with fluorine, but the head provides a "handle" that can be used to absorb the PFAS into cell membranes where it can stay and cause all kinds of issues.

Re: 3M heads to trial in ‘existential’ $143B forever-chemicals litigation

#165

Post by eesmith »

jeff-davis wrote: post #88

If the chemicals are bad, and everywhere, we need a reaction time faster than 50 years. For new inventions (not well-known issues), it would be far better to be fast-reacting and no-fault rather than slow-reacting with vengeance. Run studies as the use of the chemicals scales up and start raising warnings early so the company has time to collect more information and adapt formulas or applications. As the costs become…

> Run studies as the use of the chemicals scales up and start raising warnings early so the company has time to collect more information and adapt formulas or applications

Part of the issue, and why this is 'existential', is that 3M appears to have known about the issues and deliberately hid the studies from the government or downplayed them. See https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Per-_and_polyfluoroalkyl_subst... citing https://theintercept.com/2018/07/31/3m-pfas-minnesota-pfoa-p... where you can read:

] A lawsuit filed by Minnesota against 3M, the company that first developed and sold PFOS and PFOA, the two best-known PFAS compounds, has revealed that the company knew that these chemicals were accumulating in people’s blood for more than 40 years. 3M researchers documented the chemicals in fish, just as the Michigan scientist did, but they did so back in the 1970s. That same decade, 3M scientists realized that the compounds they produced were toxic. The company even had evidence back then of the compounds’ effects on the immune system, studies of which are just now driving the lower levels put forward by the ATSDR, as well as several states and the European Union.

For a large company like 3M, the goal isn't to figure out who really needs the new chemical, it's to figure out how to profit the most from that chemical. And who will fund all the testing required? I can just hear the cry of "too much government paperwork" and "bureaucratic obstacles in the way of the innovation and the free market."

Re: 3M heads to trial in ‘existential’ $143B forever-chemicals litigation

#166

Post by biofunsf »

arcticfox wrote: post #160
joshe wrote: post #117

Strange that we sue companies for selling products we haven't even bothered to ban yet. The idea that 3M "knew the whole time" is kooky when we aren't even sure now, 15 years after people started looking into this, whether we should ban them. Scientists, regulators and legislatures should decide what the rules are and then hold companies accountable for actually breaking the rules.

If the other commenter saying "The problem is 3M scientists have know toxicity to human and have withheld the information to the public and regulators" is accurate, your point is invalid. How could we ban a product that we were misled on.

I totally agree if the toxicity is known. But the fact that these chemicals aren't banned completely, must mean that this isn't yet widely excepted?

Toxicity is a wide spectrum so the truth could be somewhere in between. Maybe teflon coated products don't have enough to be toxic, but dumping the chemicals wholesale into the water supply is enough to be toxic. And 3M could have concealed this high-dosage toxicity from regulators. (I'm trying to reconcile "3M scientists have know toxicity to humans" and the fact that these chemicals aren't banned)

Re: 3M heads to trial in ‘existential’ $143B forever-chemicals litigation

#167

Post by chiefalchemist »

pcurve wrote: post #9

The chemicals in question are of type PFAS and believe it or not, they're still legal to use today, though they're being phased out and banned in a few years. The problem is 3M scientists have know toxicity to human and have withheld the information to the public and regulators. Since 1970s.

Actually, the problem is, we allow new chemicals to be introduced with minimal if any testing. Imagine if medical chemicals (i.e., drugs) were allowed the same Wild West approach?

In short, industrials chemicals are innocent until proven guilty. That's great for the justice system. It's a complete clusterfuck for Mother Nature and all her creatures, including humans.

Re: 3M heads to trial in ‘existential’ $143B forever-chemicals litigation

#168

Post by cpncrunch »

graeme wrote: post #145
fluoridation wrote: post #133

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Doing something that's not illegal is not a loophole. A loophole involves doing something that would otherwise be illegal in a manner that makes it ambiguously not illegal, often due to a poorly-made law.

A lawsuit is about harm . If it's a civil lawsuit, you can absolutely be sued for doing things which you know to be harmful to others, even if they aren't crimes. That's what a tort is. The purpose of such private lawsuits it to give people a legal mechanism for redress that doesn't involve physically attacking each other or trying to legislate everything.

>know to be harmful to others

This is the key fact. I had a look at the evidence, and I'm not seeing any harm myself.

See:

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Per-_and_polyfluoroalkyl_subst...

Taking an example of developmental problems, there is this study:

https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pmc/articles/PMC4344877/

but it doesn't seem to have been replicated, at least in mice:

https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pmc/articles/PMC5345697/

Re: 3M heads to trial in ‘existential’ $143B forever-chemicals litigation

#169

Post by valleyer »

s1artibartfast wrote: post #89
nickelpro wrote: post #78

Earlier quoted context omitted.

If I buy a candy bar from a bankrupt chocolate company I don't inherit any liability from the candy bar. "Breaking up" a company by selling its assets and distributing the profits to creditors absolutely does vanish the liability.

I think maybe we're confusing terms here. Breaking up a company normally means separated into smaller existing companies. If you buy 3m's candy bar division, you still might be on the hook for the forever chemicals the candy shop dumped in the river. If you're just talking about dissolving a company and selling off the tangible assets, not selling off functional business units then I agree, liability doesn't follow m…

What statute or case law supports this distinction between material goods and business units?

It seems reasonable to me that you could absolutely purchase a business unit from a bankrupt company without any associated liabilities. Of course, you'd pay the full price for it (as compared to the discount you'd be able to negotiate if you accepted liabilities). And, of course, the proceeds of the sale would go to the creditors before the shareholders.

Re: 3M heads to trial in ‘existential’ $143B forever-chemicals litigation

#170

Post by JadoJodo »

basisword wrote: post #151
omnicognate wrote: post #141

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Cast iron skillets just take a bit of getting used and are then zero maintenance and last for ever. The problems people have with them are usually due to trying to season them and doing it so badly (due to abundant online misinformation) they'd have been better off not doing it at all.

How would you suggest seasoning and maintaining cast iron?

I have several now in various sizes that are in a great place now, seasoning-wise. After each use, I rinse the pan with warm water and a small amount of soap. I use a Lodge scrubbing tool if there are things stuck on.

I then dry it with a towel, heat up the pan with Avocado or Bacon grease until it almost starts smoking. I then use a paper towel to wipe out the pan and it stays on the stove until the next use.

Of the pans I have now (bought over the past 2 years), 3 are seasoned well enough that they’re effectively non-stick.

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