It's not a question of protecting the producer, it's the fact that the producer is making something that has at least some benefit to society - the containers. If we stop them from producing the containers, then society loses out on that benefit. It may still be worthwhile to stop them, but businesses exist to the benefit of their customers and stopping them is not without it's own costs.

We banned the use of asbestos in most situations, and therefore lost the benefit of an excellent building and insulation material. But we decided that was a worthwhile tradeoff considering the well-established health impacts.