Missouri appeals court won’t send Abbott’s appeal of $495 million preterm baby formula verdict to higher court

By Diana Novak Jones

June 23 (Reuters) – A Missouri appeals court on Monday declined to send Abbott Laboratories’ appeal of a $495 million verdict in a case claiming the company’s specialized formula for premature infants caused an Illinois girl to develop a dangerous bowel disease to the Missouri Supreme Court.

The ruling leaves in place, for now, the 2024 verdict against the company, which is facing hundreds of similar lawsuits over claims the cow’s milk-based products cause premature infants to develop necrotizing enterocolitis, or NEC, an often deadly disease. 

A spokesperson for Abbott said the company plans to appeal directly to the Missouri Supreme Court.

“We stand by the safety of our preterm infant nutrition products and the vital role they play,” the spokesperson said.

The appeals court did not explain its reasoning in the brief order, which comes a little more than a month after it upheld the verdict after finding no errors in the trial.

Attorneys for the plaintiff, Margo Gill, an Illinois mother whose infant daughter was diagnosed with NEC, also did not immediately respond to requests for comment.

A jury in St. Louis awarded Gill $95 million in compensatory damages and $400 million in punitive damages at the end of a trial over her claims that Abbott failed to warn about the risk of NEC associated with its formula products for premature babies.

Nearly ​1,000 similar lawsuits have been filed against Enfamil manufacturer Mead Johnson, a unit of Reckitt, as well as Abbott, which makes Similac formulas. More than 700 of the ​cases are centralized in an Illinois federal court, with others pending in state courts including Illinois, Missouri and Pennsylvania. 

NEC, which mostly affects premature newborns, causes the death of bowel tissue and ‌has an ⁠estimated mortality rate of more than 20%.

The companies have said that while breast milk protects against NEC, their formulas do not cause it and that the benefits of breast milk have long been known to clinicians. 

U.S. regulatory agencies ​and a National Institutes of Health-convened working ​group said in a 2024 report ⁠that current evidence links higher NEC rates to the absence of breast milk, rather than to formula use.

The products in question are cow’s milk-based formula and products for fortifying mother’s milk that are specially made for infants in hospital settings, not ordinary formula available to consumers in stores.

Abbott CEO Robert Ford suggested in 2024 that the preterm products might become unavailable because of the litigation.

The companies have had a mixed record in the few cases to go to trial thus far, with some juries siding with the companies and others with the parents.

Earlier this month, an Illinois appeals court reversed a $60 million verdict against Mead Johnson over claims the company failed to warn that its ‌products for premature babies could cause a deadly bowel disease, saying the jury wasn’t properly instructed on the law. 

The case is Gill v. Abbott Laboratories, case number ED113162 in the Missouri Court of Appeals for the Eastern District.

For Abbott: James Bennett of Dowd Bennett and W. Jason Rankin of HeplerBroom

For Gill: Michael Ketchmark and Scott McCreight of Ketchmark & McCreight

(Reporting by Diana Novak Jones)