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Johnson & Johnson has been ordered to pay $70 million in compensatory damages and $347 million in punitive damages to a woman who claimed to have developed ovarian cancer as a result of using J&J powder products. Baby/talcum powder contains talc, a clay mineral:
Johnson & Johnson has been ordered to pay $417m (£323.4m) to a woman who says she developed ovarian cancer after using products such as baby powder. The California jury's decision marks the largest award yet in a string of lawsuits that claim the firm did not adequately warn about cancer risks from talc-based products.
A spokeswoman for Johnson & Johnson defended the products' safety. The firm plans to appeal, as it has in previous cases. "We will appeal today's verdict because we are guided by the science," Carol Goodrich, spokesperson for Johnson & Johnson Consumer Inc, said in a statement.
The evidence around any link between talc use and cancer is inconclusive. Johnson & Johnson, headquartered in New Jersey, faces thousands of claims from women who say they developed cancer due to using the firm's products to address concerns about vaginal odour and moisture. Johnson & Johnson has lost four of five previous cases tried before juries in Missouri, which have led to more than $300m in penalties.
Previously: The Baby Powder Trials: How Courts Deal with Inconclusive Science
(Score: 0) by Anonymous Coward on Wednesday August 23 2017, @10:44AM
I'd bet the particles get phagocytosed by immune cells and distributed around the body. Talc/clay is probably not easily catabolized. Also, anything, and I do mean anything that leads to a need for additional cell division will lead to increased cancer risk.[1] This is at the level of common sense (every time a cell divides there is some risk of error, so more divisions -> more overall risk), but for some reason this still isn't readily acknowledged.
https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pmc/articles/PMC54830/ [nih.gov]