Monsanto ordered to pay $857 million to Washington school students and parent volunteers over toxic PCBs
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Monsanto on Monday was ordered to pay $857 million to a group of seven former students and parent volunteers at a Washington state school who claimed the company's chemicals sickened them.
The judgment, which was reported by Bloomberg, AFP, Reuters and other news outlets, comes as Monsanto is facing thousands of lawsuits over its weed-killing chemical Roundup. Last month, the company was ordered to pay $332 million to a man who said Roundup caused his cancer.
In the most recent case, the former students and parent volunteers claimed that exposure to Monsanto's polychlorinated biphenyls, or PCBs, from fluorescent light fixtures caused a host of health problems, including brain damage and autoimmune disorders. PCBs, which were banned from production in 1979 due to their toxicity, were commonly used in caulking, light fixtures and other parts of buildings from the 1950s to 1970s, according to Massachusetts' Bureau of Climate and Environmental Health.
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