Kansas woman sues Bayer and Elanco, claiming Seresto collar killed dog – Kansas City Business Journal – The Business Journals

A Leawood woman is suing Bayer Corp. and Elanco Animal Health Inc., claiming her dog Bea died after suffering serious side effects from a pet product that has generated hundreds of millions of dollars in sales for the companies.
Kathryn Byrd hired a team of litigators, including Michael Williams, a founding partner of Kansas City law firm Williams Dirks Dameron LLC. Her lawsuit was filed Nov. 2 in a federal court in the District of Kansas.
In the suit, she accuses Bayer Corp., the American subsidiary of Leverkusen, Germany-based life sciences company Bayer AG, of misleading consumers about the dangers of the Seresto flea-and-tick collar. She’s also suing Greenfield, Indiana-based Elanco (NYSE: ELAN), the product’s current owner, for the same reasons.
The lawsuit states that the Environmental Protection Agency received more than 98,000 incident reports, including reports of about 2,500 pet deaths all allegedly linked to the Seresto flea-and-tick collars.
Byrd’s legal team is seeking class-action status.
Prior to selling its animal health division to Elanco in August 2020, Bayer AG reported selling about $300 million in Seresto flea-and-tick collars annually.
Bayer, which maintained its U.S. animal health headquarters in Shawnee, always has maintained the collars were safe for use on pets. Elanco continues to maintain the products are safe, too.
The lawsuit said the U.S. House of Representatives’ Subcommittee on Economic and Consumer Policy conducted a 16-month investigation into the collars, issuing a staff report in June that recommended a recall [PDF] due to the “dangers it posed to pets and humans.”
The lawsuit also states that Canada has banned the sale of the collars after reviewing incident and toxicology studies, concluding that it posed too great a risk to animals and humans to be safe for use.
“At no point have defendants disclosed this information to U.S. consumers,” the lawsuit states. “To the contrary, they have maintained and represented that Seresto collars are safe for pets to use. Despite defendant’s claims, Seresto collars have resulted in millions of dollars in damages for pet owners — both in the form of collars that they overpaid for or would have never purchased had consumers known of Seresto’s dangers, and also in veterinarian and other medical expenses incurred by pet owners with pets injured by the Seresto collar and its pesticides.”
Byrd accuses Bayer and Elanco of violating the Kansas Consumer Protection Act and breach of express warranty. She seeks injunctive relief, statutory and monetary damages, punitive damages, interest and attorney fees.
Bayer and Elanco have not responded to the lawsuit at this time.
Byrd’s other lawyers are Rachel Soffin, a partner with Knoxville, Tennessee-based class-action firm Milberg Coleman Bryson Phillips Grossman PLLC, and Michael Reese, the founder of of New York-based litigation firm Reese LLP.
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