Don't Give Pesticide Manufacturers Immunity for Harming People

I am writing to express my strong opposition to SB14 (Brown) and HB544 (Diehl), which would undermine critical protections for public health and safety. These bills seek to bar users of certain agricultural chemicals from bringing “duty to warn” claims against agricultural manufacturers should the users become harmed. Specifically, these bills seek to protect agricultural manufacturers from lawsuits for harm caused by exposure to their chemical products governed by EPA and/or the federal Fungicide, Insecticide and Rodenticide Act. Corporations that by the very nature of their business deal in dangerous products (not because the product has a defect or there was a manufacturing defect, but because the product itself is inherently dangerous to humans) are susceptible to litigation when their products are not sufficiently labeled warning the user of the health risks. Those who would bring claims against agriculture manufacturers have usually been farmers and pesticide applicators who were exposed to these chemicals and later diagnosed with diseases such as Non-Hodgkin’s Lymphoma and other cancers. There have been several cases filed against Bayer/Monsanto involving glyphosate and in many cases the harmed parties have received large jury awards and settlements to compensate them for their health harms. As of 2022, Bayer settled over 1,000 lawsuits paying out approximately $11 billion and faces an additional 30,000 lawsuits pending. Agriculture chemical manufacturers are upset by all the lawsuits facing them and in retaliation, they have chosen to lead a nationwide effort to shield themselves from liability for harms caused. Missouri is only one of several states where this exact language has been filed. This is an attempt to shield large chemical companies from legal accountability for harms they may cause. While companies like Bayer may feel overwhelmed by the number of lawsuits they have settled and are still in, this is the cost of doing business when you manufacture a product that is inherently harmful and fail to provide adequate warning to the users so that they can make an informed decision about whether to use your product. The farmers and chemical applicators in our state should not be stripped of their legal right to sue for failure to warn.