by Alison Bowler

Created on: January 10, 2009   Last Updated: November 01, 2009

In 1957, a drug, produced by the German drug company Grunenthal, was released following the drug safety trials normal for that time. The drug had been tested on rodents and seemed to be safe. It was marketed as a sedative and anti-emetic and, as such, was prescribed to pregnant women in many countries around the world. The drugs name has become well known for the tetragenic syndrome it caused. The world was to become all too aware of Thalidomide.

To many pregnant women suffering through morning sickness the drug Thalidomide seemed a blessing it eased their symptoms and also allowed a good nights sleep. However, the blessing turned into a nightmare as children started being born with severe birth defects.

The most common and obvious was the shorted limbs known as phocomelia, which comes from the Greek and means seal limbed. In this condition, the long bones of legs or arms are shortened or missing. The hands and feet of the affected limbs appear flipper like. Children could be born with any number of their limbs affected by this condition. Other conditions seen were the addition of small vestigial extra limbs and occasional mental disorders.

As the number of children born with these defects increased, Thalidomide was eventually implicated as a possible cause. At this point further animal testing was carried out using primates and rabbits instead of rodents. The young of the new set of animals were born with similar defects as the children. Therefore, the name Thalidomide children was given to the innocent victims of the drug.

An estimated 12,000 children were born with this condition worldwide. Most of those births occurred in Europe and Africa. The drug may have also been responsible for numerous miscarriages as well but this cannot be proven.

The United States was fortunate to have Frances Kelsey reviewing the drug for FDA approval. As the drug was freely available around the world, approval was expected. However, she decided insufficient testing had been carried out and FDA approval for the drug was not granted. As a result, only seventeen Thalidomide babies were born in the States these resulting from drugs imported from other countries outside of government approval.

Once the drug had been shown to be tetragenic the manufactures withdrew it from use and investigations on how it caused damage to the children began. Research found that Thalidomide acts by targeting blood vessels leading to areas that are undergoing growth. If the mother took the drug at

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