Plaintiffs seek class action in DuPont Teflon lawsuit

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Plaintiffs seek class action in DuPont Teflon lawsuit

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Plaintiffs seek class action in DuPont Teflon lawsuit
Cookware owners claim that the coating carried health risks

The Associated Press

Apr 21, 2006

DES MOINES, Iowa -- Owners of Teflon-coated pots and pans in 15 states want their cases combined in a $5 billion class-action lawsuit claiming DuPont failed to disclose possible health risks from the cookware.

The lawsuits claim DuPont continued to tell the government and consumers for years that Teflon was safe even though its own studies showed the material could become toxic when heated "enough to fry an egg," according to Des Moines attorney Kim Baer, who represents six plaintiffs from Iowa.

U.S. Magistrate Celeste Bremer didn't signal at a hearing yesterday when U.S. District Judge Ronald Longstaff will rule on the request to certify the cases as a class action.

DuPont attorney Adam Hoeflich of Chicago said that Teflon has a 40-year history of safe use and that no studies show the material can become toxic. "Not one study has shown that there is any harm to consumers," he said in an interview with The Associated Press.

Perflourooctanoic acid, or PFOA, was once used to make Teflon at DuPont's Spruance plant in Chesterfield County, but company officials have said it did not pose a threat to workers or the environment. Its use at Spruance was discontinued in 2004.

The plaintiffs won't be seeking to show that anyone has been injured as a result of using Teflon-coated cookware, according to Baer. Instead, the case will likely center on DuPont's failure to notify people of the possible health risks of using Teflon-coated products.

"It's what DuPont knew, when they knew it and when they told the public about it and whether or not there are still things that they know that they haven't shared," Baer said.

If the cases are certified as a class action, plaintiff lawyers would be able to argue that they represent potentially millions of consumers who have owned and used Teflon-coated products and seek damages for them all.

Hoeflich said DuPont objects to class-action certification. "We're talking about different people who bought different cookware at different times and used it differently for a host of different reasons," he said.

Attorneys for the plaintiffs have estimated that a successful class-action case could cost DuPont as much as $5 billion.

A judicial panel in February set U.S. District Court in Des Moines as the place to hear the initial stages of the cases from California, Colorado, Florida, Illinois, Iowa, Massachusetts, Michigan, Missouri, New Jersey, New York, Ohio, Pennsylvania, South Carolina and Texas.

Additional cases are expected to be filed.

The lawsuits allege DuPont concealed studies that showed that PFOA used in the Teflon manufacturing process releases toxic particulates when heated to 464 degrees. The lawsuits claim the particles can cause damage to rats within 10 minutes and death at longer exposures.

The lawsuits also claim that at 680 degrees Teflon-coated pans release six toxic gases including cancer-causing agents and PFOA, which has been determined to likely be a cancer-causing agent in humans.

But that government agency says it doesn't believe customers should stop using the Teflon products. "EPA wants to emphasize that it does not have any indication that the public is being exposed to PFOA through the use of Teflon-coated or other trademarked nonstick cookware," the EPA Web site says.

DuPont agreed last year to pay $16.5 million to settle government allegations that the company hid information about the dangers of PFOA.

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