First Australian lawsuit filed linking popular weedkiller to cancer

A Melbourne gardener has launched legal action against pharmaceutical giant Bayer, in the first Australian legal case linking Roundup to cancer.

Tony Carbone, Managing Partner at Carbone Lawyers, the firm representing the gardener, said there is a large body of evidence linking the weedkiller to cancer.

“In our client’s case, he was a gardener from 1997 until three years ago. He was exposed to Roundup on a regular basis.

“We say that prolonged exposure to Roundup, over a long period of time, has caused his non-Hodgkin’s lymphoma and leukemia,” he told 3AW’s Ross and John.

“There’s quite a body of oncologists in the United States that have given evidence in these cases, and if the need arises we will get them involved,” he said.

In the past year in the United States, Bayer has lost three legal cases against people suffering cancer which they said was linked to Roundup use.

In 2015, the World Health Organisation’s International Agency for Research on Cancer said glyphosate, the herbicide in Roundup, was “probably carcinogenic to humans”.

Bayer says the product is safe.

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