Is J&J approaching the end of its talc litigation hangover?

Johnson & Johnson has made a $5.5 billion bid to finally bring more than 15 years of litigation over the safety of its talcum powder products to a close.

The settlement offer is dependent on 95% of all remaining claimants signing up to the deal, and – according to the company – comes after a US court and the plaintiffs' legal counsel acknowledged they were unlikely to prove that talc products caused ovarian cancer.

J&J has previously settled around 95% of claims that the products caused the asbestos-related lung cancer mesothelioma, mostly through agreements with individual claimants.

The ovarian cancer litigation was pursued mainly as a class action, representing tens of thousands of claimants, and J&J reckons that the new deal will bring around 76,000 to a conclusion.

According to the plaintiffs' lawyers, there is a cap on individual payout amounts but no limit on the number of claimants, so the total settlement bill could increase. They also said the deal only settles existing claims, and does not address any future lawsuits, which makes it different from J&J's earlier, repeated attempts to settle the litigation using a bankruptcy route.

J&J's head of litigation, Eric Haas, said that the plaintiffs "effectively conceded their inability to prove specific causation by withdrawing their experts on the topic in two bellwether cases."

The company won a major legal victory earlier this month when a federal judge in a New Jersey court said lawyers representing around 69,000 claimants must provide stronger evidence their cancer resulted from talc use, or have their complaints dismissed.

"While we are confident the company would have ultimately prevailed with further litigation, as it has in the vast majority of cases tried to date, ‌this resolution allows the company to put this matter behind it and remain focused on its mission to develop medicines and devices that save lives," continued Haas.

The offer commits J&J to a first payment of no more than $3 billion in 2027, and no additional payments due before 2028. It also includes a provision that the company's former over-the-counter (OTC) division, which was spun out as standalone company Kenvue in 2023, is indemnified against any litigation costs in the US and Canada.

Litigation over talc products is also being pursued in other jurisdictions, including the UK, and Kenvue has responsibility for those cases.

In 2023, J&J took all its talc-based products off the market and replaced them with alternatives using cornstarch.

In a statement, the company said recent legal judgments, including the New Jersey ruling, "affirmed the company's longstanding position that the talc claims are premised on junk science that has been rejected for decades by US scientific organisations and regulatory agencies, as well as independent experts."