Abbott to pay $495 million in damages after girl developed dangerous illness from premature infant formula

A jury found Friday that Abbott Laboratories’ specialized formula for premature infants caused an Illinois girl to develop a dangerous intestinal disease, ordering the health care company to pay $495 million in damages.

The verdict in state court in St. Louis, Missouri, comes in the first of hundreds of similar lawsuits against the company over the formula pending in courts across the country, which Reuters has seen through the Courtroom View Network.

Margo Gill, an Illinois resident who filed a lawsuit against Abbott, alleged that the company failed to warn that its formula could cause a potentially fatal condition called necrotizing enterocolitis (NEC) in premature babies.

The jury awarded him $95 million in compensatory damages and $400 million in punitive damages.

The jury’s verdict was not unanimous and was supported by 9 of the 12 jurors in the case. To reach a verdict in a civil case in Missouri, three-quarters of the jurors must agree.

“Companies have to be honest about their products, whether they’re good or bad,” said Gill’s attorney, Jack Garvey.

“Where there is a risk associated with the use of infant formula for premature infants, parents have a right to know what the issues are.”

Abbott said he strongly disagreed with the verdict and would seek to have it overturned.

Scott Stoffel, an Abbott spokesman, said specialized formulas and fortifiers, like this one, are among the only options available for feeding premature infants.

“Verdicts like these, where science and the opinions of health professionals who spend their lives caring for these babies are ignored, make it difficult to continue supplying these products indefinitely,” Stoffel said.

Necrotizing enterocolitis, which causes death of intestinal tissue, mainly affects premature newborns and has a mortality rate of between 15 and 40%.

Gill’s child, Robynn Davis, who developed NEC after being given Abbott preterm formula while in a neonatal intensive care unit in 2021, survived but suffered irreversible neurological damage from her condition and will require long-term care.

Lawyers for Abbott, which makes the brand-name formula Similac, argued at trial that Robynn’s long-term injuries were caused by birth trauma that deprived her brain of oxygen.

They said that while breast milk reduces the risk of esophageal enterocolitis (ECN), specialized formula is sometimes necessary and life-saving for premature babies.

Nearly 1,000 lawsuits have been filed against Abbott, formula maker Enfamil, Reckitt Benckiser or both in federal and state courts.

More than 500 cases are centralized in federal court in Illinois, while others are pending in Illinois, Missouri and Pennsylvania.

The lawsuits claim the companies failed to warn doctors that infants who received formula were at higher risk of necrotizing enterocolitis than infants who were breastfed or who received breast milk or formula derived from breast milk.

Reckitt, like Abbott, has denied the allegations.

Like all NEC lawsuits, Friday’s case involves cow’s milk formula and breast milk supplements specifically designed for infants in hospitals, not regular formula available to consumers in stores.

The first trial against Reckitt in Illinois ended in a $60 million jury verdict in March. Reckitt appealed that verdict, arguing that the plaintiff’s case relied on unreliable expert testimony.

The dispute has concerned some investors.

Reckitt’s share price fell about 15% after the March verdict and has not fully recovered.

The NEC Society, a patient-led nonprofit organization fighting the disease, criticized the lawsuits, saying “dietary decisions should be made at the bedside, not in courtrooms.”

NEC’s lawsuits are separate from ongoing litigation against Abbott over the shutdown of its Sturgis, Michigan, plant and subsequent recall of lots of infant formula over possible contamination, which contributed to a national infant formula shortage in 2022.

No trial took place in these cases.