US Supreme Court reduces thousands of lawsuits against Roundup for failure to warn about cancer
The United States Supreme Court has placed a limit on thousands of lawsuits filed in state courts that accused Bayer of failing to warn about the alleged link between the herbicide Roundup and cancer. The decision represents a significant legal victory for the German company.
In a 7-2 trial, justices reversed a Missouri jury verdict that had awarded John Durnell $1.25 million. He claimed to have developed non-Hodgkin’s lymphoma after years of contact with glyphosate, the main component of Roundup. The Court agreed with Bayer that a federal law regulating pesticides prevents warning failure lawsuits based on state law from proceeding in court.
After the decision was announced, Bayer shares jumped approximately 16%.
Bayer’s position in the case was endorsed by former President Donald Trump’s administration.
Conservative minister Brett Kavanaugh, rapporteur of the majority decision, argued that the US Environmental Protection Agency (EPA) had already concluded that glyphosate is not carcinogenic. Therefore, the agency did not require a cancer risk warning on Roundup packaging.
Kavanaugh detailed that the legislation impedes Durnell’s claim because it “would require Monsanto to add a cancer warning to the Roundup label, even though federal law requires Monsanto to use the EPA-approved label without the cancer warning.”
In a dissenting opinion, liberal Justice Ketanji Brown Jackson, with the support of conservative Justice Neil Gorsuch, stated that Durnell’s claim would impose on Monsanto labeling requirements consistent with those required by federal law and therefore should not have been invalidated.
Minister Jackson considered the decision “remarkable and regrettable”, assessing that it “unjustifiably closes the court’s doors to compensation claimants for moral damages like Durnell”.
Bayer’s acquisition of Roundup occurred in 2018, as part of the purchase of agrochemical company Monsanto for $63 billion. Since then, more than 100,000 individuals have filed lawsuits in US state and federal courts, alleging a connection to the disease. The German pharmaceutical and agricultural company expressed concern that these processes could compromise its ability to supply the herbicide to farmers.
Intensifying litigation had already led Bayer to remove glyphosate from the consumer version of Roundup. Before the Supreme Court’s deliberation, the company indicated that a favorable outcome could virtually end disputes related to the product.
Bayer CEO Bill Anderson expressed satisfaction with the decision, classifying it as beneficial for American farmers.
“This litigation entails enormous costs for the company and has affected public trust. The decision brings justice, albeit belated, to an issue that should have been clarified much earlier. It is time to put this behind us,” said Anderson.
Before Thursday’s rise, Bayer shares had fallen just over 50% since the Monsanto acquisition.
Throughout the court case, the company reiterated that the regulatory agency EPA has consistently concluded that glyphosate does not cause cancer and has approved its product labels without the need for any warning.
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Faced with possible billions of dollars in liability, Bayer had announced in February a settlement proposal worth $7.25 billion to resolve tens of thousands of existing and future lawsuits. The company clarified that this agreement would not cover claims arising from pending resources or those that did not fall within the terms, which total approximately 1 billion dollars.
Activists’ criticisms of the impact on public health
Environmental activists and other groups expressed strong discontent with the court decision.
“Once again, the Supreme Court has sided with large corporations to the detriment of people and the environment. Today’s decision is a disaster for public health,” said Tarah Heinzen, legal director at the environmental advocacy group Food and Water Watch.
“The harm caused by this decision will perpetuate our epidemic of cancer, infertility and general chronic disease for generations,” said Kelly Ryerson, co-executive director of the advocacy group American Regeneration and campaigner for the Make America Healthy Again campaign, who posts on social media under the pseudonym “The Glyphosate Girl.”
The heart of the extensive controversy lies in the Federal Insecticide, Fungicide, and Rodenticide Act (FIFRA), an American legislation that regulates the marketing and labeling of pesticides, preventing states from establishing different or additional requirements.
The measure states that pesticides cannot be “mislabeled,” which includes labels that do not contain adequate warnings to protect health and the environment.
Bayer argued that Durnell’s claims are void under FIFRA. The company argued that the EPA has repeatedly approved labels without such cancer warnings, demonstrating that these products were not misleadingly labeled, and that the labels cannot be substantially modified without the agency’s approval.
Durnell’s lawyers countered, asserting that despite Roundup’s EPA registration, the label could still be challenged for misleading labeling. They also argued that Durnell’s claims are not barred since Missouri state law, which requires products to adequately warn of dangers, imposes the same requirements as FIFRA’s deceptive labeling prohibition.
Experts predict a new phase for Bayer
Markus Manns, fund manager at Union Investment, described Thursday’s decision as a crucial milestone for Bayer, suggesting that, a decade after the Monsanto acquisition, the company is “entering a new era.”
“Although future lawsuits are not completely ruled out, they will become considerably more difficult. A definitive breakthrough would occur if the settlement was accepted by the plaintiffs and approved by the competent court in July. This would definitively close the chapter in Bayer’s glyphosate litigation, allowing management to fully concentrate on operational and strategic issues,” explained Manns.
In 2019, Durnell initiated legal action against Monsanto in Missouri state court, alleging that the company failed to warn consumers about the risks associated with Roundup and glyphosate.
He was diagnosed with a rare and often aggressive form of non-Hodgkin’s lymphoma, a cancer that affects white blood cells, and attributed the disease to his exposure to Roundup starting in 1996. For about two decades, he worked as a “sprayer” for a homeowners association in St. Louis, eliminating weeds in local parks without wearing protective equipment, as detailed in court documents.
In 2023, a jury returned a verdict in Durnell’s favor, and in 2025, a state appeals court upheld that decision.
