Evan Plotkin, a Connecticut man who reportedly used the company’s talc powder products for decades before developing mesothelioma, an uncommon and severe type of cancer, has been awarded $15 million by Johnson & Johnson (J&J) in a landmark court decision. A jury in Fairfield County, Connecticut Superior Court rendered the verdict, and it further said that J&J would be subject to further punitive damages, which the presiding judge would later decide upon.
Not long after learning of his diagnosis, in 2021, Evan Plotkin filed a lawsuit against J&J. He asserted that breathing in the baby powder produced by the company—which he claimed included asbestos, a known carcinogen—caused his illness. The jury’s verdict highlights persistent doubts about the safety of talc-based goods, especially J&J’s baby powder, which has come under fire for a possible cancer link.
Plotkin’s lawyer, Ben Braly, conveyed his happiness with the jury’s decision while highlighting J&J’s responsibility for marketing and selling a product that they knew included dangerous ingredients. On the other hand, J&J’s vice president of litigation, Erik Haas, said that the company intends to appeal the trial judge’s “erroneous” rulings, implying that the jury was not informed of crucial details regarding the case. Haas contended that talc is harmless, doesn’t contain asbestos, and doesn’t cause cancer, according to decades’ worth of independent scientific reviews.
This decision is a part of a bigger story involving J&J, which is presently attempting to resolve claims from more than 62,000 people who say the company’s talc products caused them to develop ovarian and other gynecological cancers. In order to resolve these claims, J&J has offered a roughly $9 billion bankruptcy settlement; however, the process has been delayed by legal challenges from certain plaintiffs’ attorneys. It’s crucial to remember that the bankruptcy agreement only impacts cases pertaining to gynecological cancers; Plotkin’s and the other, more limited mesothelioma claims are unaffected.
Once widely used and trusted, J&J’s talc-based products have come under increasing criticism over time. In 2020, the firm voluntarily removed its talc-based baby powder from the American market after rising worries about the goods’ safety. This case brings to light the ongoing discussion about corporate accountability and consumer safety, as well as the wider ramifications for those claiming harm from exposure to potentially dangerous products.
SOURCE :
HINDUSTAN TIMES
