On Monday a microscope researcher serving as a plaintiff expert witness in a trial accusing Johnson & Johnson of causing a man’s cancer told a jury that company officials had gotten a testing lab to alter its findings of asbestos in baby powder.
“Do you have the same high regard for them (McCrone Group lab) as you did years before?” Joseph Satterley, attorney for plaintiff Anthony Valadez, asked.
“No,” Dr. William Longo answered. “They allowed their client (J&J) to have them change the results.”
The McCrone Group, a noted asbestos testing laboratory in Illinois, had found asbestos in samples of baby powder, but instead had described the results as “non-quantifiable,” according to Longo.
“Even after they found asbestos in the mines they said they never found anything,” Longo added.
The trial in the Alameda Superior Court is being streamed live courtesy of Courtroom View Network.
Valadez is suing Johnson & Johnson and other corporations, including retailers Safeway and Target, plus LTL Management Company, claiming exposure to talc powder for 23 years between 1998 and 2022 caused his mesothelioma, a rare cancer of the linings of the lungs.
Valadez has pericardial mesothelioma, the rarest of three types of the disease. The other two are pleural and peritoneal mesothelioma.
Johnson & Johnson has faced 40,000 lawsuits across the country in recent years over its talcum powder. It discontinued selling talc worldwide this year in favor of corn starch which scientists claim is safe.
Longo, an electron microscope researcher with the Materials Analytical Services (MAS) lab in Georgia, specializes in the analysis of asbestos-containing materials. He has been a frequent and important plaintiff witness in past talc powder trials and told Satterley that asbestos had been confirmed in Johnson & Johnson baby powder.
“It doesn’t take much weight for there to be billions of asbestos fibers (in a sample) because they are so small,” Longo said.
Five different types of testing of samples are done. Through the heavy liquid separation method, TEM or transmission electron microscope, the SEM scanning electron microscope, PLM or polarized light microscopy and XRD or X-ray diffraction method. Longo said heavy liquid and TEM were the best methods, XRD the least sensitive.
“Only TEM can see individual fibers,” Longo said. “Polarized light cannot.”
Longo told Satterley the price for one of the high-powered scopes can run $1 million.
Heavy liquid involves using a spinning tube in which liquid is placed to separate heavier materials including asbestos fibers which settle at the bottom of the tube. Longo said the method is quicker and avoids wasting time. He compared it to not having to look for needles in a haystack.
“It’s the best way,” he said of the heavy liquid testing. “There is a different density to the liquid from the asbestos fibers.”
In past trials plaintiff attorneys have accused company officials of avoiding the liquid separation method because they were afraid it would turn up asbestos fibers and opted instead for the XRD testing.
“Have you documented asbestos in the baby powder?” Satterley asked.
“We have,” Longo said.
“In historical samples, did you document asbestos?”
“Our lab did,” Longo said.
“In off-the-shelf baby powder?”
“Yes sir.”
Longo said asbestos fibers are identified as having as least a five-to-one ratio (five times longer than width), as recognized by the Environmental Protection Agency (EPA) and the International Standards Organization (ISO).
He said the Colorado School of Mines had identified needle-like fibers in the baby powder as far back as the 1970s.
Longo agreed he had once described the McCrone Lab as one of the best in the country but his opinion changed with the acquisition of new information that he said had “bothered him.”
Longo said McCrone lab researchers had described as "non-quantifiable" samples with four asbestos needle-like structures found in them while with five structures they would have been identified as asbestos.
“If you had four (fibers) they would say it’s non-quantifiable,” Longo said. “It’s not scientifically valid to give that without information. You don’t have information on how much (asbestos) is there.”
In the U.S. there are perhaps 10 to 15 cases of the kind of mesothelioma Valadez has, according to testimony at trial.
Defense attorneys are basing their case on the premise that Valadez’s disease is so rare and that with millions of people using the baby powder it could not be the cause of his illness. They also have suggested that the Merced resident’s disease could have been caused by exposure to asbestos from another source. Valadez’ father reportedly worked at housing job sites as a handyman and Valadez attended school in an old building.
Satterley exhibited slides that showed asbestos fibers looking like dark rod-like structures.
“Do these fairly represent the asbestos in J&J baby powder?” Satterley asked.
“Yes sir,” Longo responded.
Labeled an amphibole group, asbestos minerals include chrysotile, amosite, anthophylitte, crocidolite, tremolite and actinolite
Satterley said the fibers migrate into the body’s pleura and lymphatic system and take up position in the linings of the lungs.
“Mesothelioma is a signature of asbestos,” he said.