The Legal Community Is Waiting On A New Jersey Bankruptcy Judge To Proceed With Talcum Powder Cancer Trials

The company can not deny the incriminating facts that have emerged over the last five years

Wednesday, January 12, 2022 - There is little breaking news this week regarding the Johnson's Baby Powder ovarian cancer and mesothelioma trials, however, the legal saga remains as interesting as ever. Trials and legal proceedings have been suspended until the end of January 2022 pending the decision of a New Jersey bankruptcy judge whether or not to accept the company's bankruptcy request. Johnson & Johnson, a company with 4 billion dollars in cash, a diversified, highly profitable product line, and a wholesome, family-values reputation for safety and purity, is fighting to protect their assets by declaring bankruptcy. Not the entire company will be bankrupt, just their talcum powder business. The company formed a separate entity called LTL management and funded it with $2 billion in cash offset by their talcum powder legal liabilities. More than 40,000 lawsuits against Johnson & Johnson allege that plaintiffs have developed ovarian cancer or mesothelioma of the lungs caused by the long-term use of Johnson's Baby Powder. The company filed for bankruptcy in North Carolina with a judge knowledgeable about the company's controversial "Texas Two-Step" financial maneuver. The first thing the judge did, however, to Johnson & Johnson's surprise, was to grant a request made by the plaintiff's bar to move the bankruptcy venue to New Jersey where Johnson & Johnson is headquartered and where the 40,000 lawsuits have been organized into multidistrict litigation (MDL). MDL is different from a class-action lawsuit where cases are grouped due to each plaintiff having similar claims, having used the same product, for the same amount of time, and developed the same disease. MDL saves the court thousands of hours and millions of dollars in costs by not repeating administrative proceedings and discovery items for each of the tens of thousands of trials. MDL in the Johnson's Baby Powder cancer trials also focused for nearly a year on the scientific aspects of whether or not the product contained asbestos, a known cancer-causing agent. The hearings determined that Johnson & Johnson, the Cosmetics Products Safety Council (CPSC), and the US Food and Drug Administration (FDA) got together to implement a talc/asbestos testing method that found little if any asbestos in talc. The talc/asbestos testing method has been challenged by attorneys representing women who have developed ovarian cancer and have won hundreds of millions of dollars in punitive damages in more than two dozen trials over the past five years. Plaintiffs have relied on the expert witness testimony of Dr. William Longo, a Georgia-based microscope researcher, whose tests have found asbestos in nearly every bottle of Johnson's Baby Powder it tested. Dr. Longo's test results were mirrored in 2020 by those conducted by the FDA whose positive talc/asbestos findings prompted Johnson & Johnson to discontinue selling the iconic brand of baby powder in the United States and Canada. Johnson & Johnson stated that the move was due to a general Covid pandemic-related restructuring and had nothing to do with the FDA's findings. Johnson & Johnson tells reporters that Johnson's Baby Powder is safe, pure, and asbestos-free. Johnson's Baby Powder continues to be sold in Europe, Asia, and India.

Information provided by TalcumPowderCancerLawsuit.com, a website devoted to providing news about talcum powder ovarian cancer lawsuits, as well as medical research and findings.