LONDON (ShareCast) - (Sharecast News) - Monsanto faces a legal case in which it is accused of "bullying scientists" and suppress evidence of the cancer risks of its weed killer.
The firm was taken to trial by DeWayne Johnson, a Californian man who suffers from spreading cancer and claims that his cancer is linked to the Roundup product from Monsanto. He is just one of thousands with similar claims against the company.

Johnson's trial will hear from 10 current or former Monsanto employees.

Monsanto lawyer George Lombardi at the start of the trial said that "the scientific evidence is overwhelming that glyphosate-based products do not cause cancer and did not cause Mr Johnson's cancer".

The case will center on glyphosate, a widely used herbicide, which Monsanto began marketing as Roundup in 1974. The products are now registered in 130 countries and is found in food, water sources and the urine of agricultural workers.

In 2015 the World Health Organisation classified glyphosate as probably carcinogenic to humans and its use has been forbidden in California.

Monsanto was recently acquired by the German firm Bayer who said the Roundup brand would soon become extinct.

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