MIDLAND, Mich. (June 1)—Dow Corning Corp. has left Chapter 11 bankruptcy protection for the first time in nine years.
A federal judge approved the company's Joint Plan of Reorganization, which sets conditions for settling the claims of more than 100,000 women who said they were injured by their Dow Corning silicone-gel breast implants. Dow Corning Chairman Gary Anderson said his company's emergence from Chapter 11 will allow it to concentrate on serving its customers in a wide variety of industries with silicon materials and services.
Dow Corning, which entered Chapter 11 on May 15, 1995, while facing more than 19,000 breast implant-related lawsuits, cited studies from the National Academy of Sciences and elsewhere which showed no correlation between silicone implants and connective tissue disease.