Another conviction for Bayer

Due miliardi di dollari d’indennizzo a una coppia ammalatasi per il Roundup. Rilevando Monsanto il gruppo tedesco ha ereditato migliaia di denunce

A California court has ordered Bayer to pay a couple $2 billion in settlements. Both had fallen ill with cancer and for this they accused the German pharmaceutical multinational of having marketed a carcinogenic herbicide. This is the third conviction of its kind in the United States for Bayer, which acquired Monsanto which produces Roundup.

Bayer, che solo negli Stati Uniti deve far fronte a 13’400 azioni legali, ha espresso delusione per la sentenza e ribadito che il Roundup e il suo controverso principio, il glifosato, non sono dannosi.

What is glyphosate

Glyphosate — or more correctly glyphosate, or in the international version glyphosate — is an amine identified for the first time in the 1950s by a chemical and pharmaceutical multinational Switzerland and then in the 70s re-synthesized by chance by the US giant Monsanto, a giant that was recently acquired by the German Bayer.

Monsanto patented the product under the Roundup trademark. This herbicide changed the agricultural scenario, helping to increase crops and feed today's highly populated world: it demonstrated formidable effectiveness in drying plants and at the same time very modest toxicity for humans; it penetrates very little into the soil, where it is degraded by natural bacteria.

The exclusivity of the patent expired in 2001 and, while many chemical companies around the world began to produce it in competition with competing names (for example with the Rodeo or Accord brands), at the same time a war of opposing lobbies began around this compound.

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