Reckitt Chief Defends Safety of Baby Formula, Will Fight Verdict

Reckitt Benckiser Group Plc’s chief executive officer vowed to fight to overturn a verdict that blamed one of the company’s Enfamil formulas for the death of a premature baby.

Enfamil Premature 24 “is safe and critical and we have no plans to stop providing the product,” CEO Kris Licht told analysts on a conference call Monday. “We are confident that this was an incorrect verdict and we will do everything we can to overturn it.”

Jurors last week awarded an Illinois woman, Jasmine Watson, $60 million in damages, saying the UK consumer-goods company’s Mead Johnson Nutrition unit failed to ...