The NAM joined with 6 other organizations urging a California appeals court to affirm a lower court ruling that refused to hold a manufacturer liable for failing to disclose the hazards that arose from products made, sold or installed by another manufacturer. Under common law, manufacturers are only liable for hazards in their own products. We opposed the creation of a new duty to warn about hazards a manufacturer does not produce or put in its products. The third-party liability concept that plaintiffs sought to impose here is so extreme that almost no plaintiff during the 30-plus years of asbestos litigation has dared even raise it until recently. Such a duty would require bread or jam manufacturers to warn of the foreseeable risk of peanut allergies in peanut butter and jelly sandwiches.
Consumer safety could also be undermined by the potential for over-warning (the "Boy Who Cried Wolf" problem) and through conflicting information that may be provided by manufacturers of different components and by makers of finished products. The duty to warn should be placed on the party in the best position to know the risk, and any economic loss should be borne by the party who caused it.
On February 16, 2010, the California court affirmed the lower court ruling and rejected a new duty to warn in these circumstances.