No-Li Brewhouse scores two medals
Spokane-based No-Li Brewhouse announced Thursday it had earned more accolades for it products earlier this month .
The company reported that it won its 13th and 14th brewing medals at the International Can Can Awards, which were held in Atlanta. The competition judges beers from around the world.
No-Li’s Corner Coast Golden Ale won a gold medal and its Threezy Does it Hazy IPA won a bronze.
“The International Can Can Awards go to the heart of Craft Brewing in America,” said Davis Harsh, No-Li’s can line operator. “We are proud that No-Li six-pack can beers represent some of the best canned beers in America.”
Bayer seeking to settle Roundup lawsuits
FRANKFURT, Germany – German pharmaceutical and chemical company Bayer said Thursday it would take a provision of $4.5 billion against second-quarter earnings to put the company on what it said would be a path to closure of thousands of U.S. lawsuits over a weedkiller containing the chemical glyphosate.
The company said would continue to pursue legal appeals at the U.S. Supreme Court and was hopeful of success.
But it set aside the money to account for a second scenario in which it has to manage the costs of the remaining claims through a mix of litigation and settlement.
The company has faced thousands of legal actions from people claiming that glyphosate causes non-Hodgins lymphoma, a type of cancer.
“We want to provide comfort to our investors that the glyphosate litigation exposure should now be reasonably accounted for and leaves significant upside in the event of a favorable Supreme Court decision on the case,” CEO Werner Baumann said in a conference call with investment analysts.
“It is important for the company, our owners, and our customers that we move on and put the uncertainty and ambiguity related to the glyphosate litigation behind us.”
Bayer inherited Roundup weedkiller and the litigation by acquiring Monsanto in 2018.
The $4.5 billion comes on top of about $9.6 billion in earlier litigation set-asides. The company says the compound is safe.
The company additionally said that it would replace glyphosate in its Roundup weedkiller with other ingredients when it comes to sales for the U.S. residential lawn care market from 2023, subject to regulatory review of the new ingredients.
That is where most of the court cases have come from.
Bayer said replacing glyphosate was aimed at managing litigation risk and was not based on any safety concerns.
Products containing glyphosate will still be available for professional and farm use.
AstraZeneca to seek U.S. approval for vaccine
LONDON – AstraZeneca said Thursday that it intends to seek U.S. approval for its COVID-19 vaccine later this year, further delaying the application even as the company announced it had already delivered more than 1 billion doses to other countries.
The Anglo-Swedish drugmaker said the application has been delayed because it has decided to ask the U.S. Food and Drug Administration for full regulatory approval, rather than the fast-track emergency use authorization originally anticipated.
As part of this “biologics license application,” the FDA has requested extensive data from clinical trials around the world, as well as data on real world use of the vaccine.
“We have an enormous amount of data, clinical data and all of the data coming from the work we’ve done around the world,″ AstraZeneca CEO Pascal Soriot said on a conference call with reporters. “A BLA is a much bigger submission than the emergency use approval.”
AstraZeneca has promoted its relatively cheap, easy-to-handle shot as a “vaccine for the world” and has already received authorization from more than 170 countries.
The company, which has promised to deliver the vaccine on a nonprofit basis throughout the pandemic, said it provided about 90% of the doses distributed by the COVAX facility for low- and middle-income countries in the first half of the year.
From staff and wire reports