Mired in controversy, JNJ baby powder to go off shelves from 2023
The company faces about 38,000 lawsuits from consumers and their survivors claiming its talc products caused cancer due to contamination with asbestos, a known carcinogen.;
New Delhi: Johnson & Johnson will stop selling talc-based baby powder globally in 2023, the drugmaker said on Thursday, more than two years after it ended US sales of a product that drew thousands of consumer safety lawsuits.
"As part of a worldwide portfolio assessment, we have made the commercial decision to transition to an all cornstarch-based baby powder portfolio," it said, adding that cornstarch-based baby powder is already sold in countries around the world.
In 2020, J&J announced that it would stop selling its talc Baby Powder in the United States and Canada because demand had fallen in the wake of what it called "misinformation" about the product's safety amid a barrage of legal challenges.
The company faces about 38,000 lawsuits from consumers and their survivors claiming its talc products caused cancer due to contamination with asbestos, a known carcinogen.
A shareholder proposal calling for an end to global sales of the talc baby powder failed in April.
A 2018 Reuters investigation found that J&J knew for decades that asbestos, a carcinogen, was present in its talc products. Internal company records, trial testimony and other evidence showed that from at least 1971 to the early 2000s, J&J's raw talc and finished powders sometimes tested positive for small amounts of asbestos.
In response to evidence of asbestos contamination presented in media reports, in the court room and on Capitol Hill, J&J has repeatedly said its talc products are safe, and do not cause cancer.
Sold since 1894, Johnson's Baby Powder became a symbol of the company's family-friendly image. An internal J&J marketing presentation from 1999 refers to the baby products division, with Baby Powder at the core, as J&J's "#1 Asset", Reuters reported, although the baby powder accounted for only about 0.5% of its U.S. consumer health business when the company pulled it off the shelves.
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