Lawsuits Over Talc-Based Products
- Johnson & Johnson has faced thousands of claims that their talc-based baby powder has caused cancer, and has settled lawsuits
- The science linking the talc-based powder to cancer is not fleshed out enough for experts to warn consumers about the product
- According to The American Cancer Society, some studies may show, for any individual woman, there may be a small, increased cancer risk from using talc-based powder, but the overall increase is likely to very be small
In Missouri, Johnson & Johnson has just awarded a woman $2.1 billion after she claimed their talcum-based products caused her to develop ovarian cancer. Additionally, she cited that the company was aware that asbestos was in their baby powder and continued to sell it.
Read More“No study can ever say definitively what the cause of cancer is, but in this case (studies) show there’s not a substantial increase in ovarian cancer risk,” says Dr. Dana Gossett, a gynecologic oncologist at the University of California, San Francisco.
There’s been dozens of litigation ads about talcum based baby powder — is the science true?
Is Talc Related To Cancer Risk?
After decades and thousands of lawsuits alleging the products caused cancer, Johnson & Johnson decided to pull its talc-based baby powder from shelves in the U.S. in May and instead will provide cornstarch-based baby powder. However, the company is still maintaining that there's no proof that their baby powder is linked to any form of cancer.
However, due to claims, there have been many studies conducted to try and answer whether talc-based products actually cause cancer, or are linked with risk. A study from NIH’s National Institute of Environmental Health Sciences and the National Cancer Institute notes that while there have been studies that found using talc based baby powder leads to a slight increase in ovarian cancer risk, the limitation of these studies is that they rely on a woman's memory to detail how much of the products she was actually using and these results can be biased. One study found that those who had used the powder had an 8% increased risk of ovarian cancer compared to those who never used it. However, epidemiologist Katie O’Brien, one of the researchers of the study, says the 8% increase is not statistically significant.
Since results are mixed, there might be a chance that talc can be linked to cancer, but once again, it’s not proven. According to Dr. Thomas Sporn, a pathologist at Duke Health, there is some talc that is contaminated by certain forms of asbestos, but it doesn’t account for all talc. “When you shake out the powder, it becomes airborne. I don't know if you've ever dusted a baby's bottom it creates a little cloud and there's a potential that you could breathe in the dust from that, which may or may not contain asbestos," says Dr. Sporn.
Overall, the science linking the talc-based powder to cancer is not fleshed out enough for experts to warn consumers about the product. For that reason, Johnson & Johnson says that existing inventory of the products can be sold, but the company says that due to the backlash and tainted public opinion, it's no longer makes sense to try to sell to the North American market.
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