The article was initially published in 2000 in the journal Regulatory Toxicology and Pharmacology. A retraction notice, published by Elsevier, the company that oversees the journal, cites undisclosed conflicts of interest, unacknowledged contributions from Monsanto employees and reliance on unpublished Monsanto studies. It concludes that the retraction of the study was necessary to maintain the integrity of the journal.

“The scientific concerns … regarding (ghost-) authorship(s) and potential conflicts of interest, none of which have been responded to, are sufficient to warrant this action,” the retraction authors said.

Health Canada said the withdrawal does not affect its current assessment of glyphosate because the review was only one source among many.

“While this review was previously considered in our assessment, it is important to note that the primary data sources were independently evaluated by the Pest Management Regulatory Agency (PMRA),” the department said. “Therefore, the retraction of this review does not affect our previous review conclusions.”

The department said its 2017 re-evaluation considered more than 1,300 studies and remains consistent with the most recent 2023 review by European regulators. PMRA will continue monitoring international assessments and new scientific research.

Monsanto, whose internal studies and communications were cited in the retraction notice, was acquired by Bayer in 2018. The company has faced continuing lawsuits over glyphosate products, creating uncertainty about Bayer’s long-term commitment to glyphosate.

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The settlement resolves accusations that Bayer and its Monsanto unit failed to substantiate their repeated claims about Roundup products containing the active ingredient glyphosate.

These included that Roundup “won’t harm anything but weeds” and “do not pose a threat to the health of animal wildlife,” as well as suggestions in since-removed YouTube videos that Roundup was safer than detergent and soap.

James said the claims violated state laws against false and misleading advertising, and breached Monsanto’s 1996 settlement with New York over its advertising of Roundup at the time.

“Pesticides can cause serious harm to the health of our environment, and pose a deadly threat to wildlife,” and companies that make them must be “honest” with consumers about the dangers, James said in a statement.

Thursday’s settlement requires Bayer to stop advertising glyphosate-based Roundup as a safe and non-toxic product.

The $6.9 million will be spent on reducing the impact of pesticides on pollinators and aquatic species (all figures US$).

Bayer did not admit or deny wrongdoing.

In a statement, the German company said it was pleased to settle. It also noted that the attorney general probe, which began in 2020, drew no scientific conclusions about Roundup.

Bayer has faced extensive litigation over whether Roundup causes cancer since it spent $63 billion to buy Monsanto in 2018.

It agreed to settle much of that litigation for $10.9 billion in 2020. As of February, about 109,000 of the 154,000 claims Bayer has faced had been settled or deemed ineligible.

— Jonathan Stempel is a courts correspondent for Reuters in New York.

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The Eighth U.S. Circuit Court of Appeals found that a federal jury was wrongly told to assess punitive damages for Bayer and BASF together, rather than separately. It said a new trial was needed to determine punitive damages for each company.

BASF, which had argued on appeal that the joint award was unfair because the case focused on the conduct of Monsanto, now owned by Bayer, said in a statement that it was pleased with the ruling.

“We are confident that BASF’s reprehensible conduct and sizable net worth will result in an even larger punitive damages award upon retrial,” Tracey George, a lawyer for farmer Bill Bader, said in an email.

Bayer did not immediately respond to a request for comment.

The order does not affect the jury’s verdict that the companies are responsible, and leaves in place $15 million in non-punitive damages (all figures US$).

The jury originally awarded $250 million in punitive damages, but a federal judge later slashed the punitive portion to $60 million.

Bader’s lawsuit, one of more than 100 similar lawsuits over dicamba, went to trial in early 2020. Bayer in June 2020 announced it would pay up to $400 million to settle the remaining dicamba lawsuits.

Bader, who operates Missouri’s largest peach orchard, said dicamba drifted onto his property from nearby soybean and cotton farms.

Monsanto began selling dicamba-tolerant soybean and cotton seeds it developed in 2015 and 2016, respectively, leading to an explosion of dicamba use, Bader and other farmers have said.

The U.S. Environmental Protection Agency imposed restrictions on the use of dicamba in November 2018.

— Brendan Pierson reports on U.S. health law from Reuters from New York.

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The justices turned away a Bayer appeal and left in place a lower court decision that upheld $25 million in damages awarded to California resident Edwin Hardeman, a Roundup user who blamed his cancer on the pharmaceutical and chemical giant’s glyphosate-based products (all figures US$).

The Supreme Court’s action dealt a blow to Bayer as the company maneuvers to limit its legal liability in thousands of cases. The justices have a second Bayer petition pending on a related issue that they could act upon in the coming weeks.

Bayer’s shares were down 2.9 per cent on the news, eliminating gains over the previous two trading sessions.

U.S. President Joe Biden’s administration in May urged the court not to hear the Bayer appeal, reversing the government’s position previously taken under former President Donald Trump.

Bayer has lost three trials in which Roundup users have been awarded tens of millions of dollars in each, while also winning four trials. Bayer had pinned hopes for relief on the conservative-majority Supreme Court, which has a reputation for being pro-business.

Bayer said it “respectfully disagrees” with the court’s decision and that the company is “fully prepared to manage the litigation risk associated with potential future claims in the U.S.”

On Friday, a federal appeals court ordered the U.S. Environmental Protection Agency (EPA) to take a fresh look at whether the active ingredient glyphosate poses unreasonable risks to humans and the environment.

The San Francisco-based Ninth U.S. Circuit Court of Appeals agreed with several environmental, farm worker and food safety advocacy groups that the EPA did not adequately consider whether glyphosate causes cancer and threatens endangered species.

Bayer has asked the Supreme Court to review the verdict in Hardeman’s case, which was upheld by the Ninth Circuit in May 2021. Hardeman had regularly used Roundup for 26 years at his home in northern California before being diagnosed with a form of non-Hodgkin’s lymphoma.

Bayer said in its March annual report that it had resolved about 107,000 cases out of about 138,000 cases overall.

Bayer, which also makes aspirin, Yasmin birth-control pills and the stroke prevention drug Xarelto among other products, has argued that the cancer claims over Roundup and glyphosate go against sound science and product clearance from the EPA.

The agency has upheld guidance that glyphosate is not carcinogenic and not a risk to public health when used as indicated on the label.

Bayer has said it should not be penalized for marketing a product deemed safe by the EPA and on which the agency would not allow a cancer warning to be printed.

The lawsuits against Bayer have said the company should have warned customers of the alleged cancer risk.

Roundup-related lawsuits have dogged Bayer since it acquired the brand as part of its $63 billion purchase of agricultural seeds and pesticides maker Monsanto in 2018.

Bayer struck a settlement deal in principle with plaintiffs in June 2020 but failed to win court approval for a separate agreement on how to handle future cases.

In July 2021, Bayer took an additional litigation provision of $4.5 billion in case of an unfavourable ruling by the Supreme Court or in case the justices declined to consider its appeal.

The provision came on top of $11.6 billion it previously set aside for settlements and litigation over the matter.

Bayer plans to replace glyphosate in weedkillers for the U.S. residential market for non-professional gardeners with other active ingredients.

— Lawrence Hurley is Reuters’ U.S. Supreme Court correspondent in Washington, D.C.; additional reporting by Ludwig Burger.

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Bayer in August filed a petition with the Supreme Court to reverse a lower court decision that upheld $25 million in damages awarded to California resident Edwin Hardeman, a Roundup user who blamed his cancer on the German pharmaceutical and chemical giant’s glyphosate-based products (all figures US$).

The Supreme Court’s decision on whether to take up the matter is being closely watched as Bayer maneuvers to limit its legal liability in thousands of cases. U.S. Solicitor General Elizabeth Prelogar in the coming months is due to file a brief expressing the administration’s views.

Bayer said in a statement that it is encouraged by the court’s announcement, which often indicates the justices are interested in hearing a case.

The U.S. government “has consistently found that glyphosate-based herbicides can be used safely and are not carcinogenic, and has stated that a cancer warning would be false and misleading and misbrand the product,” Bayer’s statement said.

Bayer has lost three appeals against verdicts that sided with users of Roundup, awarding them tens of millions of dollars each. Bayer has pinned hopes for relief on the conservative-majority Supreme Court, which has a reputation for being pro-business.

Bayer asked the Supreme Court to review the verdict in Hardeman’s case, which was upheld by the San Francisco-based Ninth U.S. Circuit Court of Appeals in May. Hardeman had regularly used Roundup for 26 years at his home in northern California before being diagnosed with a form of non-Hodgkin’s lymphoma.

There are more than 25,000 related claims that Bayer has not settled yet.

Bayer, which also makes aspirin, Yasmin birth-control pills and the stroke prevention drug Xarelto among other products, has argued that the cancer claims over Roundup and its active ingredient glyphosate go against sound science and product clearance from the U.S. Environmental Protection Agency. The EPA has upheld guidance that glyphosate is not carcinogenic and not a risk to public health when used as indicated on the label.

Bayer has said it should not be penalized for marketing a product deemed safe by the EPA and on which the agency would not allow a cancer warning to be printed.

The lawsuits against Bayer have said the company should have warned customers of the alleged cancer risk. Bayer wants the Supreme Court to find that the EPA label approval under a federal law called the Federal Insecticide, Fungicide and Rodenticide Act preempts the “failure to warn” claims brought under state law.

Roundup-related lawsuits have dogged Bayer since it acquired the brand as part of its $63 billion purchase of agricultural seeds and pesticides maker Monsanto in 2018.

Bayer struck a settlement deal in principle with plaintiffs in June 2020 but failed to win court approval for a separate agreement on how to handle future cases. That settlement deal applied only to U.S. cases and not to those in Canada, where Bayer said at the time it’s “not contemplating a settlement.”

In July, Bayer took an additional litigation provision of $4.5 billion in case of an unfavourable ruling by the Supreme Court or in case the justices declined to consider its petition. This leaves “significant upside” if the Supreme Court rules in its favour, according to Bayer.

The provision came on top of $11.6 billion it previously set aside for settlements and litigation over the matter.

Bayer plans to replace glyphosate in weedkillers for the U.S. residential market for non-professional gardeners with other active ingredients.

It will continue to sell the herbicide to farmers, who rely on it heavily and whose role in the litigation has been described as negligible by Bayer.

As of late October, Bayer had reached settlements in about 98,000 cases out of about 125,000 cases overall.

A California jury last week found that Roundup did not cause a woman’s non-Hodgkin’s lymphoma.

— Reporting for Reuters by Lawrence Hurley and Ludwig Burger; additional reporting by Tom Hals.

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The jury in San Bernardino County found that Donnetta Stephens’ cancer was not caused by her exposure between 1985 and 2017 to Roundup and its active ingredient glyphosate.

She sued the company for negligence and failing to warn her of the dangers of Roundup.

“Despite everyone’s best efforts, it was impossible to try a coherent case via Zoom with our schedule,” said Fletch Trammell, Stephens’ attorney. “We plan to appeal and look forward to trying the case again in more favourable circumstances.”

Trammell noted similar cases typically took weeks to try and the Stephens case took more than four months due to technical problems and long breaks.

Bayer said the verdict was consistent with the evidence.

The Stephens case is the fifth over Roundup to go to a trial verdict.

Plaintiffs were awarded tens of millions of dollars in the first three but Bayer got its first favourable trial outcome on Oct. 5, which lifted the company’s stock price.

The company said in May it would be more selective in settling cases and had said Stephens’ settlement demands were unreasonable.

Roundup-related lawsuits have dogged the company since it acquired the top-selling brand as part of its US$63 billion purchase of agricultural seeds and pesticides maker Monsanto in 2018.

The company has spent billions of dollars to settle around 96,000 Roundup cases of about 125,000.

Bayer is still pursuing appeals in two of the three verdicts it lost, including one the company hopes will be considered by the U.S. Supreme Court, where a ruling for Bayer could effectively end the Roundup cases.

— Reporting for Reuters by Tom Hals in Wilmington, Delaware.

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Destiny Clark alleged that her son Ezra developed Burkitt’s lymphoma after he was exposed to Roundup which she sprayed on weeds at the family residence.

Clark sued Monsanto, which is owned by Bayer, for failing to warn her of the cancer risks of using Roundup.

The verdict is the fourth involving Roundup and the first in the company’s favour.

Roundup-related lawsuits have dogged Bayer since it acquired the brand as part of its US$63 billion purchase of agricultural seeds and pesticides maker Monsanto in 2018.

Bayer said in a statement the verdict was consistent with decades of science and research showing the safety of glyphosate, the main ingredient in Roundup.

“While we have great sympathy for Ezra Clark and his family, the jury carefully considered the science applicable to this case and determined that Roundup was not the cause of his illness,” the company said.

An attorney for Clark said they will consider an appeal.

“We’re disappointed for the boy and his family,” said Fletcher Trammel. “We have multiple Roundup cases set across the country over the next year and look forward to trying them.”

Two of the other three verdicts are still being appealed by Bayer, including one the company hopes will be considered by the U.S. Supreme Court, where a ruling for Bayer could effectively end the Roundup cases.

The company has settled around 96,000 Roundup cases of about 125,000.

In May, a federal judge rejected Bayer’s plan to resolve future cases, which would have provided compensation but limited the ability of individuals to sue.

— Reporting for Reuters by Tom Hals in Wilmington, Delaware.

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Bayer last week lost a third appeal against verdicts that sided with users of glyphosate-based Roundup, awarding them tens of millions of dollars each, leaving the drugs and pesticides group to pin hopes for relief on the United States’ top court.

Bayer on Monday asked the Supreme Court to review one such verdict by the federal Ninth U.S. Circuit Court of Appeals that found in favour of California resident and Roundup user Edwin Hardeman, it said in a statement.

The maker of aspirin, Yasmin birth-control pills and stroke prevention drug Xarelto has repeatedly argued that the cancer claims over Roundup go against sound science and product clearance from the federal environmental regulator.

“The Ninth Circuit’s errors mean that a company can be severely punished for marketing a product without a cancer warning when the near-universal scientific and regulatory consensus is that the product does not cause cancer, and the responsible federal agency has forbidden such a warning,” the company said.

Roundup-related lawsuits have dogged the company since it acquired the brand as part of its $63 billion purchase of agricultural seeds and pesticides maker Monsanto in 2018 (all figures US$).

Bayer struck a settlement deal in principle with plaintiffs last year but failed to win court approval for a separate agreement on how to handle future cases, as it intended to keep the product on the market.

Last month, it took an additional litigation provision of $4.5 billion to cover any unfavourable ruling by the Supreme Court. That came on top of $11.6 billion it previously set aside for settlements and litigation over the matter.

Among other measures to contain the legal onslaught, Bayer plans to replace glyphosate in weedkillers for the U.S. residential market with other active ingredients.

It will, however, continue to sell the herbicide to farmers, who rely on it heavily, and whose role in the litigation has been described as negligible by Bayer.

— Reporting for Reuters by Ludwig Burger.

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Bayer and class action attorneys hope U.S. District Judge Vince Chhabria in San Francisco will give preliminary approval on Wednesday to create a class of people exposed to Roundup who could get sick in the future.

The agreement would provide free medical exams and up to $200,000 in compensation if a class member is diagnosed with non-Hodgkin’s lymphoma, a cancer (all figures US$).

Chhabria in a court filing asked if it was possible to contact the potentially millions of homeowners and farmworkers who have been exposed to Roundup to notify them they were going to be bound by the settlement.

He also wanted to know how he would determine if the compensation was adequate and whether he should evaluate the plan against other options, including Bayer adding a cancer warning label to Roundup, something the company has resisted.

Chhabria noted in his final question that jury trials have gone very well for plaintiffs. Given that, the judge asked why class members should agree to a settlement that requires them to present at future trials a report from a science panel that will spend the next four years determining if Roundup causes cancer.

“The last question is a killer,” said David Noll, a professor at Rutgers Law School.

The company has said decades of studies have shown Roundup and its active ingredient glyphosate do not cause cancer and are safe for human use. Consumer groups and personal injury lawyers have criticized the plan because it prevents lawsuits for four years and bars class members from seeking punitive damages.

Bayer said in a statement that judges often raise questions for parties to address prior to hearings.

“We look forward to working with the court and the parties through the approval process to ensure the class plan is fair to all parties,” the company said.

Chhabria said if his nine areas of concern were addressed at the hearing, a second hearing would be scheduled to deal with smaller concerns.

The company last June agreed to commit $9.6 billion to settle the existing 125,000 U.S.-based claims over Roundup, which is separate from the class settlement aimed at resolving future claims.

Bayer inherited the glyphosate-based herbicide Roundup, and the litigation, as part of its $63 billion acquisition of Monsanto in 2018.

The Canadian arm of Bayer CropScience last June said those settlements “have no bearing on litigation in Canada” and the company is “not contemplating a settlement of the Canadian cases related to glyphosate.”

— Reporting for Reuters by Tom Hals in Wilmington, Delaware.

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The company said the write-downs, driven by weaker demand from farmers due to low biofuel prices, plus an increase of about US$750 million in the costs of settlement terms with U.S. plaintiffs over Roundup, resulted in a loss before interest and tax of 9.4 billion euros in the third quarter.

Bayer was caught up in litigation over Roundup, based on the herbicide glyphosate, as a result of its 2018 takeover of Monsanto for about US$63 billion, which made it the world’s largest supplier of seeds and pesticides.

“The impact of the (coronavirus) pandemic is placing additional strain on our Crop Science division. We are also facing negative currency effects,” chief financial officer Wolfgang Nickl said.

Nickl said a massive depreciation of the Brazilian real was weighing heavily on business in the world’s second-largest agricultural market.

Bayer said it was unable to say what part of the impairment was attributable to legacy Monsanto businesses, saying only that two-thirds of the writedowns were due to currency and interest rate effects.

Bayer on Sept. 30 had predicted impairment charges in the mid- to high-single-digit billion-euros range on agricultural assets and warned of a slight decline in 2021 core earnings per share.

Bayer struck an US$11 billion outline agreement with U.S. plaintiffs’ lawyers in June but a judge later took issue with a side arrangement on future cases that may yet be lodged, known as a class plan.

Addressing those concerns will prove about US$750 million more costly, Bayer said on Tuesday.

Bayer said it was “far enough along in the negotiations to know that the new plan will come in at approximately two billion U.S. dollars, an increase over the original cost of 1.25 billion U.S. dollars.”

Bayer’s shares were down 0.6 per cent at 0850 GMT, marking a loss of 22 per cent since Bayer first flagged writedowns and a likely decline in 2021 earnings on Sept. 30.

“This situation confirms our belief that Crop Science is a business with low visibility,” said Jean-Jacques Le Fur, an analyst at brokerage Bryan Garnier. He reiterated a “sell” recommendation, also citing uncertain Roundup litigation costs.

The charges more than offset combined gains booked in the quarter from the sale of its animal health business to Elanco and the divestment of a stake in industrial park operator Currenta of five billion euros.

That resulted in a net loss of 2.7 billion euros compared with an average analyst projection of one billion euros in net income.

Bayer said that 88,500 of the 125,000 glyphosate claims in the class settlement have been agreed in principle and that it was hoping to make considerable progress over the next few months.

— Reporting for Reuters by Ludwig Burger and Patricia Weiss.

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