Doesn`t gel
DOW CORNING, the US silicon products manufacturer, has agreed to a US $3.2 billion deal, ending the long-running US battle over breast implant litigation. The company will pay the amount to compensate about 170,000 women worldwide who have made breast implant claims. If all the money went to the claimants, individual payments would average nearly US $19,000. Moreover, women with claims against the company will be given an opportunity to vote on the settlement.
The company's woes began in the early 1980s, when women fitted with its breast implants started suing the company, claiming that silicon gel had leaked into their bodies and caused auto-immune disorders.
Though Dow Corning stopped making breast implants in 1992, the company filed for bankruptcy protection in 1995 as the claims began to mount. The company, while strongly denying that its breast implants caused auto-immune diseases, had made three attempts to settle out of court. All three were rejected by the claimants as inadequate. Other suppliers of silicon breast implants reached a settlement with claimants in 1995.
Related Content
- Gender-based violence and food insecurity: what we know and why gender equality is the answer
- Joint committee report on pollution of Phalguni river, Dakshina Kannada, Karnataka, 11/10/2022
- Reusables Are Doable
- Multi-actor initiatives in action: Lessons from the Sustainable Diets for All programme
- Johnson Controls 2020 Sustainability Report
- Destination: Zero Carbon-Three strategies to transform transportation in America