“Why aren’t they warning women about it?” The toxic danger in your baby powder
Scientific research ties talc powder to ovarian cancer. Now Johnson & Johnson is facing a slew of lawsuits
Deane Berg’s doctor called her in the day after Christmas, 2006, to give her the crushing news. She’d had her ovaries removed, the pathology results were back, and they could not have been much worse. Berg had stage III ovarian cancer, and her prognosis was poor.
Despite her 25 years as a physician’s assistant, Berg, then 49, knew next to nothing about ovarian cancer. Grappling with the “why me?” question, she studied the risk factors, finding just one that could apply: regular use of talcum powder for feminine hygiene.
Talc powder might be a cause ovarian cancer–who knew? It turned out that some people did. Berg was stunned to learn that since the early 1980s, a slew of studies had found that women who regularly used talc powder for feminine hygiene had higher than average rates of ovarian cancer. Yet the evidence–which fell short of proving causation–was mostly confined to medical journals and had barely made a blip on the public radar.
For millions of women, Berg included, dusting the genitals or underwear with powder was a daily ritual, like brushing teeth. Since her teens, Berg had used Johnson’s Baby Powder and Shower to Shower, another Johnson & Johnson powder marketed to women. “A sprinkle a day keeps odor away,” the ads said. “Your body perspires in more places than just under your arms.”
How could a product meant for babies be dangerous? “This is crazy,” Berg recalled thinking. “Why aren’t they warning women about it?”
So after painful rounds of chemotherapy, Berg filed a first-of-its-kind lawsuit against J&J in federal court in her home town of Sioux Falls, S.D. A mystifying verdict in October, 2013, enabled both sides to declare victory. The jury found Johnson & Johnson Consumer Cos., guilty of negligence for failing to warn of the risk of ovarian cancer, but awarded zero damages to Berg. More on this later.
