Oregon
Oregon to receive $15 million in settlement over baby powder lawsuit • Daily Montanan
Oregon will receive $15 million from Johnson & Johnson to settle allegations that the pharmaceutical and medical company marketed unsafe baby powder products to consumers.
The settlement is part of a national $700 million agreement that 43 attorneys general made with the New Jersey-based company. It’s tied to allegations that Johnson & Johnson sold baby powder and body powder products with talc, which plaintiffs alleged is linked to serious health problems that include ovarian cancer and mesothelioma, a cancer tied to asbestos exposure.
As part of the settlement, Johnson & Johnson admitted no wrongdoing, court documents show. But Johnson & Johnson stopped distributing and selling the baby powder products, sold for more than a century, when states started investigating.
“For decades, Johnson & Johnson misled consumers about the potential harms of its talc powder products,” Oregon Attorney General Ellen Rosenblum said in a statement . “Worse, they doubled down on the safety of those products, attacked credible scientific studies, refused to include warning labels on their products, and, at every turn, put profits ahead of lives. These decisions overwhelmingly harmed women.”
As part of the agreement, Johnson & Johnson agreed to stop manufacturing and selling its baby powder and other products that contain talc in the U.S.. The lawsuit also alleged the company targeted African American and Hispanic women in its marketing efforts to reverse declining sales.
Four organizations will receive $4.7 million of the settlement’s proceeds for women’s health programs.
Planned Parenthood will receive $4 million, with $2 million for Planned Parenthood Columbia Willamette in Portland and $2 million for Planned Parenthood Southwestern Oregon in Eugene.
The two groups will use the money for outreach and access to health care, with an eye on eliminating disparities among marginalized communities.
Virginia Garcia Memorial Health Center, which provides care for nearly 52,000 patients in Yamhill and Washington counties, will receive about $350,000 to increase access to ultrasounds for ovarian cancer screenings and offer more Hepatitis B vaccines.
The Oregon Health & Science University Foundation will receive $275,000 for outreach and cancer screenings for tribal communities.
And finally, the Ovarian Cancer Alliance of Oregon and Southwest Washington will get $55,750 to aid patients with ovarian cancer.
The remaining $10.3 million will go to an Oregon Department of Justice fund that the agency has discretion to use in different ways for its work, court records show. The department’s fund helps pay for various investigative, consumer protection and consumer education efforts.
Oregon Capital Chronicle is part of States Newsroom, a nonprofit news network supported by grants and a coalition of donors as a 501c(3) public charity. Oregon Capital Chronicle maintains editorial independence.
Three Oregon lawmakers say they plan to introduce a bill that would bar utilities from raising rates if they have unresolved wildfire lawsuits for three or more years, describing it as an effort to hold PacifiCorp accountable as the utility faces a series of lawsuits stemming from the deadly 2020 wildfires that ravaged the state.
Republican state Reps. Jami Cate, Virgle Osborne and Ed Diehl announced their proposal in a statement Monday, on the heels of an approved rate increase for PacifiCorp customers and a federal lawsuit against the electric power company.
The federal government sued PacifiCorp last week over the Archie Creek Fire, which ignited in Oregon’s Douglas County in September 2020 and burned more than 200 square miles, about half of which was federal land. The complaint accuses the company of negligence for failing to maintain its power lines to prevent wildfires. In its filing, the government says it brought the suit to recover “substantial costs and damages.”
A PacifiCorp spokesperson said in an emailed statement Monday that the company was working with the U.S. government to resolve the claims.
“It is unfortunate the U.S. government decided to file a lawsuit in federal district court, however PacifiCorp will continue to work with the U.S. government to find reasonable resolution of this matter,” the statement said.
The federal lawsuit was filed on the same day the Oregon Public Utility Commission approved a 9.8% rate increase for PacifiCorp’s residential customers next year. In its rate case filings, the company said its request to increase rates was partly due to higher costs stemming from wildfire risk and activity.
When the new rate takes effect in January, PacifiCorp rates will have increased nearly 50% since 2021, according to the Oregon Citizens’ Utility Board, which advocates on behalf of utility customers.
The three lawmakers said they will introduce their bill in the upcoming legislative session, which starts in January.
“The federal government is doing the right thing by filing this lawsuit, and we stand firmly behind it,” Osborne, who is set to be the future bill’s co-chief sponsor, said in a statement. “PacifiCorp needs to pay up and take responsibility for the destruction they’ve caused, and putting a stop to rate hikes is the best way to achieve it.”
PacifiCorp is poised to be on the hook for billions in damages in the series of lawsuits over Oregon’s 2020 fires.
The company has already reached two settlement agreements over the Archie Creek Fire, including one for $299 million with 463 plaintiffs impacted by the blaze and another for $250 million with 10 companies with commercial timber interests, according to its website.
In other litigation, an Oregon jury in June 2023 found it liable for negligently failing to cut power to its 600,000 customers despite warnings from top fire officials and determined it should have to pay punitive and other damages — a decision that applied to a class including the owners of up to 2,500 properties. Since then, other Oregon juries have ordered the company to pay tens of millions to other wildfire victims.
The wildfires that erupted across Oregon over Labor Day weekend in 2020 were among the worst natural disasters in state history, killing nine people and destroying thousands of homes.
— The Associated Press
On Wednesday at 2:18 a.m. the National Weather Service issued a wind advisory valid from 10 p.m. until Thursday 10 a.m. for North Central Oregon and Central Oregon.
The weather service states, “South winds 10 to 20 mph with gusts up to 45 mph expected.”
“Gusty winds will blow around unsecured objects. Tree limbs could be blown down and a few power outages may result,” adds the weather service. “Winds this strong can make driving difficult, especially for high profile vehicles. Use extra caution.”
Advance Local Weather Alerts is a service provided by United Robots, which uses machine learning to compile the latest data from the National Weather Service.
Oregon
Oregon lawmakers to introduce bill barring utility rate increases amid unresolved wildfire lawsuits
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