Pharmaceutical giant Johnson & Johnson is facing a class action lawsuit stemming from claims that its baby powder and other talc products allegedly caused ovarian cancer in women.
The legal challenge asks that women who used the products between 1960 and the present day and who have not yet filed a separate lawsuit against the company be covered in the latest lawsuit.
According to the legal filing, the company’s talc products “are defective, dangerous to human health, unfit and unsuitable to be advertised, marketed, and sold in the United States, and lacked proper warnings associated with their use.”
Plaintiffs in the legal challenge were allegedly placed at “risk of adverse health effects and/or other harms caused by their exposure” to the talc products, according to the lawsuit.
The talc products “significantly increased (or increase) their risk of epithelial ovarian cancer, fallopian tube cancer, and primary peritoneal cancer,” it adds.
Lawsuits Against Johnson & Johnson Mount
Those individuals have “necessarily paid and have become liable to pay (or may in the future pay) for medical aid, treatment, medications and other expenditures and will necessarily incur (or may incur) further expenses of a similar nature in the future as a proximate result” of using the Johnson & Johnson products, according to the legal filing.The Epoch Times has contacted a Johnson & Johnson spokesperson for comment.
While the lawsuit could potentially include thousands of women who used J&J’s baby powder and are concerned about developing ovarian cancer in the future, it does not cover the more than 61,000 plaintiffs who have already filed lawsuits against the company, seeking damages allegedly stemming from the use of the talc products.
These lawsuits claim that the products contain traces of cancer-causing asbestos, which has been blamed for causing ovarian cancer and mesothelioma, a cancer that affects the lining of the lungs.
Johnson & Johnson has repeatedly stated that its talc-based baby powder does not contain asbestos and does not cause cancer.
It halted sales of the products globally last year.
In May, the company proposed paying out $6.5 billion to resolve the claims alleging its products caused ovarian cancer via a prepackaged bankruptcy, which needs support from 75 percent of talc claimants, with a three-month voting period ending on July 26.
![A bottle of Johnson and Johnson Baby Powder is seen in a photo illustration taken in New York on February 24, 2016. (Reuters/Mike Segar)](/_next/image?url=https%3A%2F%2Fimg.theepochtimes.com%2Fassets%2Fuploads%2F2018%2F07%2F13%2F2018-07-12T225644Z_5_LYNXMPEE6B20L_RTROPTP_3_JOHNSON-JOHNSON-TALC-600x400.jpg&w=1200&q=75)
Johnson & Johnson Must Pay Oregon Woman Damages
The deal would also prevent future lawsuits from being filed against the company regarding the ovarian cancer claims and stop individuals from opting out of the deal in order to pursue separate lawsuits against Johnson & Johnson.However, Johnson & Johnson’s previous attempts to settle claims against it through bankruptcy filings have been rejected in court.
That settlement stemmed from a lawsuit in which a bipartisan coalition of attorneys general claimed the pharmaceutical giant had for years misled consumers about the safety and purity of some of its products in its advertisements, despite the products posing “significant health risks, including links to cancer, primarily due to potential asbestos contamination, a known carcinogen.”
Under that settlement, Johnson & Johnson must stop manufacturing, selling, promoting, or distributing any products containing talcum powder either directly or via a third party in the United States.
Johnson & Johnson has also not admitted any wrongdoing in relation to that settlement.