The largest mass tort in federal courts may not be about opioids or Roundup. It could be earplugs, and the docket is shaping up to be one of the largest ever.
More than 200,000 lawsuits against 3M Co. over dual-ended Combat Arms earplugs issued by the U.S. military are pending in multidistrict litigation in Florida, according to the U.S. Judicial Panel on Multidistrict Litigation’s fiscal year 2020 report, which tracks both cases transferred to MDLs and filed directly into MDLs. That amount surpasses the more than 100,000 cases brought over transvaginal mesh devices and is the largest since the height of the asbestos litigation more than a decade ago.
