I am the product of thalidomide. Mama took it in 1960-61 while pregnant with me. I had legs that were like Forrest Gump, wore braces for six months. I had six toes on each foot. The doctor took the extras off when I was born. I did not have a second set (adult teeth). When my baby teeth fell out, I didn't have any coming in. My mother never forgave herself for these things that happened to me. It was not her fault, yet she suffered with the consequences. This drug was given out regularly to women in Houston Texas at the time. For all kinds of troubles. It was touted as safe and effective 😮 we all know how those words are thrown around. I'm a healthy old lady now, so I made it through that. Just wanted to tell my tale. Thanks for listening
Thank you for your story. I too was born in Houston, way after the thalidomide tragedy, but I became familiar with it when one of the teachers at my high school told us why she had braces on her legs. I shudder to think what you went through.
Aussie here. My brother was born in 1960, and I was born in 1962, right in the middle of when Thalidomide was available to pregnant women for morning sickness. It was offered to my Mum, but she was a nurse and she knew that anything she took, we took. So she declined. Thanks Mum ❤
@@royconestoga7326 Yeah, she's awesome. We actually talked a lot about it when we were old enough to understand the horrors, and she couldn't believe how close she was.......
@@kevinsmyth364 Oh that's so sad. But I'm happy it turned out for you. The really sad thing is that people with deformities from Thalidomide were (generally) treated so badly back then
My grandmother asked her doctor about this pill when she was expecting her first or second child, but he refused to issue it to any patient. This was because he had read some of the literature about the pill and its mechanisms, and was gravely concerned by the lack of a critical study or any testing. He was influential in the area, so none of the other doctors would issue it locally. The man deserved a medal.
Me with the Covid vaccine. I am perfectly fine with vaccines that have years of testing and approval. Not animal trials or one year. Maybe it's fine, but I'm not going to risk it, especially for free to be an unpaid trial. If I'm going to suffer heath conditions, I'm getting some compensation.
@@moomyung9231 Thalidomide is NOT A VACCINE. Pills are totally different from vaccines, and any serious effects of a shot are typically instant or within hours. The entire medical R&D process was completely changed following Thalidomide, and this is why there has not been a repeat of it. The mRNA science behind two of the COVID-19 vaccines has been around for years even though this was the first successful use of it. The non-mRNA vaccines for COVID-19 use traditional methods and mechanisms that have been in use for 70 and more years, and successfully eradicated Smallpox, and nearly eliminated Polio and Measles (if people would just take the goddamn shots!). The COVID-19 vaccine roll out was one of the most successful treatments of any disease in human history, and would have probably eliminated it completely if it had been done at a greater scale. As it is, billions of doses were safely administered in a very short span of time, and there have been no confirmed examples of any lasting harm from it.
@@moomyung9231 I get your sentiment, but there has now been an incredibly high influx of research since the pandemic started. There is an incredible amount of literature thus far with the current vaccine being derived from the KP.2 strain that went around early spring 2024. I would consider taking a look at the literature for yourself
@@moomyung9231 I got the Pfizer 2 shot vaccine 2 years ago and have been fine, my sister got it and was fine, and my parents both got the Johnson & Johnson vaccines and only my father had any form of side effects which was just being tired for a few days after. I know that this is anecdotal evidence, and not solid proof that the vaccines are safe, but, I hope even this small amount of evidence could even slightly make you feel better about vaccination, because, it helps, I know it helps, because when I did get covid after that, the symptoms were just, "ow my throat hurts and I'm a bit sleepy," for a week.
@@mustaffa1611There are a million new infections a day again. How many of those are your personal share of the fault? Every few days you are statistically responsible and every few months you are responsible for someone's death. I hope you can live with that. The vack seens (forbidden word) are proven safe and have been since day 1.
@mustaffa1611 You conveniently forget that our ERs were jammed and morgue were overflowing. My cousin, a nurse, died of Covid and left a husband and three grieving children behind who struggle to this day. Shame on you for making a global pandemic fit your political stupidity in only the United States. A disease doesn't care what your politics are. People were too busy dying.
I am an American Thalidomide Survivor. My mother was an RN in New Martinsville, WV, and one of the doctors where she worked said it would improve her morning sickness so that she could continue to work. She only took 3 doses over the course of 1 week. I was born with all my fingers fused and my fingers are only 1 digit long. My hands were surgically “corrected” by a hand specialist at Northwestern University in Chicago. I am grateful and blessed to have become an RN myself. I am now retired. I never asked for accommodations or claimed any disability, but I regret that now. I wish I was more vocal and active vs. “normalizing” and ignoring my birth defects.
It's so important that you specified that you regret not asking for more compensation and help. Too often, I see people being praised for not complaining or demanding compensation even when they have every right to do so, and that just increases the already significant social pressure on others to struggle on alone in silence. I think there's a human compulsion to glorify self-denial and martyrdom, even when it causes more harm than good. It's a big part of why it can be so hard to "complain" about legitimate injustices. It's often socially easier to be one of the "good ones"- someone with a disability (or from an otherwise underprivileged group) who grins and bears it instead of speaking up or putting their foot down when they are treated poorly. Hopefully, that culture will continue to change. Nobody should feel ashamed for needing extra aid to have a chance at a level playing field with the "normal" people. Can an underprevileged person become successful with nothing but stoic grit and determination? Of course, some people can- and it's undeniably impressive. But they shouldn't have to, and it certainly shouldn't be framed as somehow righteous or morally superior.
I'm so sorry your Mum was so poorly supported by her colleagues - I am so disappointed by the lack of critical thought from the doctors who should have at least tried to know better. I'm sorry that you didn't get the kinds of support you were totally entitled to and deserved - it shouldn't have been something you were made to fight for. And the societal shaming that tells people to ask for less is insidious and awful - being able to recognise it is hard. I hope you can get what you need easily now. Each and every nurse deserves the world already.
@@thebigrussian The surgeons said it was successful, in their opinion, but my mobility is severely limited and my functional ability has always been impaired.
Yes, thalidomide changed clinical research. I worked for pharmaceutical companies in the clinical research department. There I learned the importance of clinical trials on humans. In the past new drugs were studied on men, young, healthy men in prison or military.
@@whiteyfisk9769 Part of the story though is the fact that they've learned from it. Science is not perfect, but still leagues above any religion or conspiracy theories you can come up with.
She was roundly vilified at the time, but I shudder to think how widely the consequences would have been felt if she hadn't stuck to her personal and scientific principles.
Definitely. There are heroes that go above and beyond to ensure that medical science is held to high standards and, for example, to keep people from being taken advantage of by charlatans promoting anti-parisitic drugs and horse dewormer for a recent virus.
@@sarahmacintosh6449 Another woman (alice Stewart) who found evidence of various fetal and post fetal effects due to xrays was criticized and her studies were extremely unpopular.. I was born in 1958 with a congenital defect in a ureter, which eventually destroyed a kidney, and my mother always told me that she suspected that it could have been a side effect of too many xrays.
My mother narrowly escaped being a Thalidomide baby because it was offered to my Grandma during her pregnancy in the late 50’s. Luckily my grandma is well known for not liking to take pills so she refused it
I am one of those lucky babies too..59 yrs old now. My mother had a prescription for these pills but she ate green apples instead as she said she always stopped feeling sick after eating a green apple and she craved them.
Terrifying how it essentially took this disaster for doctors to even consider that something a pregnant woman consumes could have an impact on the unborn child
That's just how science works, I think people put it on some magical pedestal of greatness, but really most of it is accidents and tragedies. We can't know something exists until it is observed, sadly in this case, it wasn't observed until babies were being born deformed.
@@bruhtholemew less so that they assumed, more so they didn't consider it or care. It is easy to see with hindsight what wasn't even on the radar at the time. It is also impossible to consider every possible outcome...and even if you could do so, you couldn't know for sure you didn't miss one.....and there is also that they may just not have cared.
That woman at the FDA is the embodiment of true public service. She put people's health and well-being ahead of all other considerations. I wish there were more like her.
Imagine being the FDA and YOU having to do the effort to NOT approve a drug. Not the manufacturer having to do the work to convince an official state body that the drug is safe.
They took saccharine off the market in the 70s because of the damage it does. People fought hard for years FOR it. The FDA finally caved and approved it again. We HAD people who cared. But the general populace is freaking stupid.
nowadays they let the companies do their own safety testing, which has not turned out well at all, but we haven't been able to get that practice reversed yet. the battle continues, between corporate greed vs best medical practices.
@@johnsheppard314It’s really disturbing that we can have all these medicines advertised with awful side effects. “Hey are you depressed? Try this drug! By the way, one of the side effects is more depression!”
The only thalidomide child I saw was a doctor in her late 40s treating my acne. A very kind person, open about her condition. I didn't think much of it back then but my mother was very impressed at how strong and dextrous her stump hands were, able to grab heavy textbooks, flipping through them with ease and nimbly handling the instruments she used on me. An inspiring case of a person not deterred by their defect and I find myself thinking about her a lot and every time thalidomide is brought up.
We had a friend at church--we're in the US but she was British--who had an incomplete left arm because of thalidomide. She could do pretty much anything that didn't need really fine pinching dexterity (and most of those things she just learned to do with her other hand).
Thalidomide has antisngeogenic effects, which means it can prevent blood vessels from forming. That is why the limbs were shortened and deformed in babies. These days, we use this to our advantage in multiple myeloma treatment as well as treatment for Hansen's disease (leprosy). Doctors are still working on directly microdosing certain tumors with it, to try to prevent the tumor's continued growth (cut off the blood supply, and the tumor may stop growing or shrink). This is generally tried on tumors that are difficult to operate on, and must be done carefully so as not to cause tumor lysis syndrome. Thank goodness for Frances Kelsey using the bureaucracy to put a stop to a risk to children in the US, so that we could reevaluate thalidomide for more appropriate uses later.
What wasn't mentioned in the documentary was that there WERE reports and research that implied that there were negative effects quite early in, but the head of the company and his buddies had that shut up in the manner they were used to doing on the good old days. It wasn't just the issue that no negative results were seen in animal trials. It's a big reason why there was such a huge stink afterwards.
@raquellofstedt9713 Of course. They just wanted to make money. There was a reason that the drug was abandoned before they purchased it and put it to market. There are plenty of drugs that are originally tested for one purpose, but determined to be much better suited for another purpose (minoxidil, sildenafil, etc.). I'm sure that there were teratogenic effects noted in test animals, but they probably figured they would be selling it for headaches and as a sleep aid, so no big deal. When it took off for morning sickness, they probably saw visions of cash and just kept quiet, hoping that, since humans were bigger, it wouldn't have the same effect.
I work as a nurse on a BMT unit, our MM patients receive a long education from a pharmacist, and sign an acknowledgement before we administer it. Oddly, we don’t give the same education when we administer the lethal dose of Melphlan pre transplant, and it literally kills you, every time.
I have seen Thalidomide covered so many times, and have rarely if ever seen the accomplishments of survivors discussed. You are quickly becoming my new standard for documenting these tragedies. Bravo 👏
Really impressed with how he handled such a sensitive topic as well. All love. And his narration has developed a pretty authoritative presence, which makes it even better.
I was born healthy in 1961. Thanks to a relative. Mum was very sick with me so the doctor prescribed thalidomide. Mum can home and got a glass of water and was about to take the first pill when it was slapped out of her hand, the lady doing the slapping was,a matron on a maternity ward. She said" if you want a healthy baby don't take that" grabbed the box and threw it in the bin.
I will always be grateful for the full life I have lived, i have been a professional driver since 1979 when I joined the British Army then I went on to drive buses and coaches till 2020 when I finally realised I was getting older. I now drive a taxi taking special needs kids to school. Without her intervention I could possibly been needing help not giving it. I always thank her for being aware of the small lives she supervised.
The BBC drama _Call the Midwife_ dealt with this (season 4 or 5, I think). The physician who supports the midwives had been prescribing Distaval/Thalidomide left and right because it had been advertised as safe, effective, and all his patients were singing its praises. Now understand, this physician was very conscientious, sympathetic, and compassionate. He was no pill pusher. He was the doctor _everyone_ wishes they had. The scene where he starts getting the reports from Germany that all is not well with this drug was heartbreaking. He sent all the midwives out to collect all the Distaval/Thalidomide that had been dispensed "...every last pill!" But without alarming the patients. ...and then the reluctance of some of the pregnant women to give up the pills. "...but they work great! They're the only thing that has helped my morning sickness!"
Don't forget Baby Susan! She and her mother become recurring characters after Baby Susan is born with all four limbs stunted by Thalidomide. Possibly giving away a disabled child and dealing with lackluster prosthetics are part of the plot.
This was actually how I initially learned about thalidomide. I was hanging out with my mum at a hotel she was staying at for a work conference and this episode happened to be playing on TV. While she wasn't old enough to even be part of the tragedy as a baby, she had learned a lot about it as a nurse and she explained everything she knew about it to me.
I was about to say about the episode of called midwives as well. They did Justice to the material that they were given and seeing the episode it made me wonder how many of those babies died as a result of the actions of the mother's or the nurses rather than the drug itself?
I knew about it before watching CtM but i never really thought about the mental health implications for the GPs who prescribed it in good faith. Dr Turners ongoing issues regarding his guilt is one of my favourite arcs in the show because of this reason.
Thanks for including the segment on successful survivors. One of the big problems with countering eugenicist rhetoric is that ablebodied people vastly underestimate the quality of life that disabled people have. Quite often if you try to get them to put themselves in the shoes of someone with a severe disability they can't do it and genuinely believe they would rather be dead, even though studies show that most people who acquire severe longterm injuries or illnesses actually adjust quite well and will sometimes even say that they're happier afterwards due to how their perspective has changed, while of course those born with deformities and injuries never knew anything different and tend to be just as happy as people born without X-ray vision are. Obviously no one's advocating for arbitrarily crippling people just to make them disabled, but it's hard to even convince people that our lives have value.
My Mom contracted polio at age 5 in the early 1950s. The doctors didn't expect her to survive...much less have any kind of a normal life. She did. She walked, even though they said she wouldn't...she graduated from school...she got married and she had 4 kids. And, she was almost always the most cheerful and optimistic person in the room. She decided that being grateful for what she had was far more enjoyable than lamenting what she had lost or what could have been. I also learned a great deal of independence and self-sufficiency from her. Her own mother taught her at an early age that she wouldn't always be around to help and that she would need to learn to do things on her own and in her own way. And she practiced that every day of her life!
@@PlasmafoxWell yeah, of course they’re bad. I am still capable of living a full life regardless of mine and so are millions, probably a billion other people too.
Incredibly well said. I have severe chronic pain due to a birth defect that was surgically corrected, and while I do carry a lot of anger for how “easy” life must be for everyone else, it’s interesting to look back at my life and trace the man I’ve become because of my pain. It takes so much more strength to find happiness in the midst of struggle than it does when everything is easy.
As a fan of Call The Midwife I knew this was gonna suck, cause frankly there's no good way to tell this story. Well done telling this horrific story so well and thoroughly. Bless Kelsey for holding her ground. sadly I don't think we (the US) would have been spared if something like this happened now.
Someone already said it but yeah, Americans were made into Guinea pigs during the pandemic with the jab. It was a lie that Pfizer did enough testing before sending these out to the entire country. Wish I wasn’t fear mongered into accepting two doses myself.
The series “Call The Midwife” has a story arc about a little girl who is born without arms due to thalidomide. The series touches on her life for a few years, and the heartbreaking reactions of others. The doctor who prescribed the drug was devastated to think he had prescribed something that had such a horrific side effect. It’s a BBC series, and on Netflix in the US. Every time someone complains about the length of time it takes the FDA to approve medications, I think about Ms Kelsey and how much she fought to keep Thalidomide off American shelves. We were lucky to have her.
I found it particularly interesting that, depending on what day you took (or started) the drug affected the type of deformity. Thank you for this (as usual) excellent video.
I found this interesting too, I didn’t find I was pregnant until a week after my missed period so I was 5 weeks when I found out, the 21 days would be 3 weeks so many women probably didn’t even know they were pregnant when they took it, very sad
I’ve heard that many thalidomide survivors now face hip, knee, and ankle issues because those joints were made to do things they weren’t meant to(using a foot to write, for example).
@@reedaharris1341 they wouldn’t have had early tests in those days to know at 3 weeks, I guess maybe they suspected or hoped they were pregnant before their missed period
A doctor I've visited has displays with bottles and packages from various medicines from the 40's-70's that have very unique looks to them. I asked if any of them ever worked, and he IMMEDIATELY started going off on how dangerous many of them were. Even outside this Thalidomide drug, many of those medicines just weren't worth taking at all.
The same lady at the FDA who kept thalidomide from entering the US later reexamined other drugs being sold in the 60s and 70s and showed that they also caused more subtle cognitive birth defects and cancer, which were not noticed for many years. I wish we had more educated regulators able to look at the big picture effects of common environmental poisons
@@Firevine I remember an anti-depressant ad on TV about 15 years ago that listed "increased risk of death" as a side effect.... wut? There was another that was "increased risk OF pregnancy"... hunh? didn't list that it had an effect WHILE preg.... "risk OF".... hunh?
Thank you for this video. I watch your videos religiously but this is the first one that relates to me personally. My grandmother took Thalidomide while pregnant with my uncle, and he was born with a stunted arm. We also think that he had an esophageal defect caused by thalidomide, that contributed to his early death due to asphyxiation. My aunt won a lawsuit for wrongful death because he was neglected in the ER while having difficulty breathing. Our medical system failed him, twice. I didn’t know him very well but I remember he was very positive and kind, just a great guy. Thanks for spreading awareness about this!
Anyone else notice that the 50-years-too-late apology by Greunenthal was the most non-apology ever? I recognize that the people running that company today are not the ones responsible in the 50s and 60s, but the apology did not admit any wrongdoing, even on the part of their predecessors.
It’s absolutely crazy how long it took us to learn such seemingly obvious things. Of course anything ingested by a pregnant mother has the potential to affect her baby. The mother is where the baby gets all of their nutrients.
Common sense versus learned men. Especially when it comes to womens health: keep your common sense. Medical support is several hundred years behind in they're learning.
@@mph1ish The shear number of children born with undeveloped arms and legs. I'd bet they did animal testing to pinpoint the connection. Probably Resis monkeys.
Friendly reminder that before 1993 women were rarely included in pharmaceutical trials. Pathologies often are misdiagnosed in women because they don't present with the 'classical' (aka men's) symptoms. Grandma was sent home with antacids when she had a heart attack and the advice to chill by her GP (no chest/arm pain, she was nauseous and had shortness of breath), woman client was refused a sleep study because 'she didn't snore so it can't be sleep apnea'
The fda standing firm on not approving a medication despite massive pressure from the pharmaceutical companies oh so they were able to hold their ground at one point
Well, one woman in the FDA held her ground. Had someone else picked it up instead of her, would there have been the same resistance? I guess we'll never know
@@liberteus That's because our republican representatives keep cutting their budget to operate!! "We are saving you money on your taxes." So we can thank them!!
Growing up in West Germany, I met several Contergan survivors in my life. One of them worked at my bank until very recently, when she retired. The fact that Contergan was not available in East Germany and elsewhere behind the Iron Curtain is part of what put researchers on the trail of what was causing the sudden spike in birth defects. Initially, they assumed it was fallout from nuclear tests, but radiation would not stop at the border, so there should have been a similar spike in cases in Eastern Europe. As for Grünenthal, it's a good thing they apologised, even if it was fifty years too late. However, the compensation fund set up for German Contergan survivors, half of which was paid by Grünenthal and half by the (West) German government, has long been used up. Ongoing compensation for the survivors is now paid solely by the German government, while Grünenthal is off the hook. Now I can imagine worse uses for my taxes, but it still irks me that the company that actually caused the disaster is not longer paying compensation to the survivors.
Just wait until.you learn about Operation Paperclip, or the history of unethical medical experiments in the USA. Those crimes were all the rage at that time, and not only in Germany.
There's a thalidomide survivor named Tony Meléndez, who was born without arms and is famous for learning to play the guitar with his feet. He visited my childhood church to perform and we heard about his story. Back in the 80s, he performed for Pope John Paul II, who was so moved, he got up and hugged Meléndez. He also has a band called Tony Meléndez and the Toe Jam Band, which is hilarious. Very cool dude.
This is one of the best episodes you have done. I had never heard about the lady at the FDA. I grew up with three thalidomide children in my circle of friends and neighbors, all born without or with drastically shortened arms. My mother escaped it for a sad reason; she had already suffered two miscarriages and did not want to take anything that might risk another one. So her children were born without the struggles and stigma our "thali" friends went through. Thanks, Mom. I always thought you might be psychic.
My college chem professor used this to teach a lesson on the arrangement of organic molecules. Two molecules with identical atoms in identical arrangements, but where some of the bonds are reflected, can have dramatically different reactions. In the case of Thalidomide, the molecule which relieves pain and suppresses nausea is entirely safe, but its reflected "twin" is an anti-angiogenic - that is, it suppresses the creation and growth of new blood vessels. Which, obviously, in a developing fetus, is going to cause problems. That same property was indeed used to treat Leprosy and studied as a treatment for some forms of cancer. Of course the original manufacturing process didn't account for separating these distinct molecules, and likely there could have been a way or producing Thalidomide that didn't have horrific side effects, though it would have been much more expensive.
Another comment mentioned some work done to try and separate the types of molecules, but they found that the molecule "switched" back to the harmful form once in the body. Nasty stuff.
I remember in high school when my teacher showed us the molecules and asked if anyone knew what happened when they were used in medicine, I was the only one who knew because I had watched a documentary earlier that year. Thalidomide was banned in Brazil in 1962 iirc and the class happened in 2014, I was surprised that it wasn't talked about more often.
I was born in 1965 and remember seeing kids with these symptoms all the time as I was a child. We had a bad name for it that I won’t repeat. But obviously now, 50 years hence we all realize that it wasn’t the fault of the kids or their parents. But I grew up being afraid of people who were so affected and I wish I could apologize to them all. I never said it to anyone’s face. But people I knew would say this in secret and it certainly wasn’t flattering. I’m ashamed.
I know the word, and it's a word used in playgrounds copiously in the 70's and 80's. You are older and wiser, and had no malice as a kid I'm sure. Fear makes us do and say irrational things.
@@lallyjoel2536Yes they at least are willing to humble themselves and change for the better, most people throughout time and still today are ever so stubborn to continue harming.
It was different time. When she was expecting me, my Mum told me that expectant Mothers were taught that what ever the doctor gave you couldn't harm the baby as it couldn't cross the placental barrier. My Mum was offered it but refused to take it, as her philosophy was tablets couldn't beat good nursing, her friend took it and her daughter was born with a stunted arm on one side and a stunted leg on the other. She lived and had a family and her hair is grey as mine!
I'm a boomer, so I remember vividly about this scandal. Much appreciation to you, sir, for treating this with the dignity and compassion it deserves. Also, how you showed that these unintended victims of this horrific tragedy have gone on to live happy and productive lives.
A rare W for the FDA. The only thing lacking from this video was an explanation _why_ such an apparent wonder drug like thalidomide had such a reaction on a fetus. I would have been very interested to hear the science behind what the drug actually does in a scientific sense.
Not a scientist or a doctor of any kind, but I remember reading somewhere that it inhibited cell growth/development. I do believe that it's used to treat some forms of cancer, but under extreme caution and supervision.
@@dawnstorm9768 Yeah, that was my guess. Which raises MASSIVE question about the mechanism behind how it had a beneficial effect. were adults actually having a similar issue, just less noticeable?
Like modern chemo, Thalidomide attacks fast growing cells such as cancer cells by inhibiting cell growth. If the cells can't grow, then they can't divide, and you don't get new cells. Desirable outcome if you want cancer cells to not be replaced. But fast growing areas of your body, like your hair or stomach lining, wear themselves out just as quickly. Thalidomide helped with morning sickness as your stomach lining wouldn't grow as fast. Therefore your digestive tract would slow or shut down to prevent your stomach from digesting itself. This included peristalsis/digestive tract contractions. No contractions, nothing in your stomach, then no vomit. it causes birth defects because a fetus is nothing but fast growing cells. They got attacked as well. If taken during the first trimester, miscarriage was inevitable. But mourning sickness is usually a 2nd trimester thing. By then the core of the baby is formed, and the extremities are being grown. Hence why Thalidomide victims would usually be missing limbs. For adults, long term use would lead to similar issues to modern chemo: Baldness, loss of nails, and digestive issues. They would self-resolve in a few months by stopping the medication. But it was rarely used long term, as mourning sickness usually lasts only a month or two.
this is your answer (in part) from another commenter: ‘interestingly it was a mix of left and right-handed enantiomers of a chiral molecule. only one of which was reported to cause birth defects (l-thalidomide). attempts to isolate the r-thalidomide molecule were undertaken but were found to undergo chiral inversion to l-thalidomide in the body.’
@@SakuraAsranArtyou still pretend it's a big issue even though the entire world smoked and your lung cancer only went up 10%. Suprise! We all die from our circulatory system springing a leak or by abnormal cells taking over. Even the generations of nonsmokers. But hey! 10% less chance you'll die from abnormal cells on your lungs! 😂
Back then safety testing was basically stand with your arm out, palm up, and we put one drop on your hand. At 15 minutes if nothing happens, it's safe, start shipping. If after 15 minutes the test subject collapses, goes into convulsions bleeding from every bodily orifice--well it doesn't matter, it occurred outside the test procedure and the data will not be recorded, still safe. This of course is an exaggeration, but it shows the kind of attitude that was prevalent at the time. Products are safe until proven otherwise. Another example of regulation by body count. But how "many" bodies does it take?
That's because it sounds better than "we want to make a sh*tload of money". And most probably start out with good intentions. Even this stuff was very good for most people, just not for pregnant women.
Interestingly it was a mix of left and right-handed enantiomers of a chiral molecule. Only one of which was reported to cause birth defects (L-thalidomide). Attempts to isolate the R-thalidomide molecule were undertaken but were found to undergo chiral inversion to L-thalidomide in the body.
As I recall the dextro [RH] version was produced in the pilot production almost, if not totally exclusive but the levo [LH] version was more prevelent during mass production.
Thank God for Frances Kelsey! I was born in the early sixties and my mom had terrible morning sickness but her doctor basically told her to eat saltines and suck it up
Suck it up is terrible advice for most things. If I didn't seek professional help for my morning sickness I would have died. She didn't let me ingest water & I was losing weight. I tried crackers & ginger ale & all the "tricks"
@janaharvey550 it is tough advice, but a lot of Dr's in the early sixties were tough on pregnant women. I was pregnant in early 90s with twins, which my Dr didn't realize until I was almost 6 months along. I was VERY sick and losing a little weight but those were the days of everything being as natural as possible and he basically told me to suck it up, but in nicer language.
@sharonsmith583 I looked it up number 1 cause of death for early term pregnancy was severe nausea until Iv fluids were invented. If I would have sucked it up I would have died. Good thing u were able too.
Dear Fascinating Horror, now that you are venturing into medical stories, may I suggest you review the case of oxygen, premature babies and retinopathy of prematurity? It all started when airtight neonatal incubators were developed as a result of technical advances during WW2. And it was the cause of Stevie Wonder’s blindness. It is a major reason why neonatologists (myself included) are so insistent that proper randomized controlled trials are carried out before ANY major change in treatment.
Isn't that when they put too much oxygen in your incubator, which causes the blood vessels in your eyes to grow way too quickly, and then your retinas detach? Exactly what happened to me so I hope he covers it
Oh! I have that! I am luckily able to see, but my vision is extremely poor and I am unable to get lasik. I also had a myriad of problems which required lazer eye surgery (to stop retinal detachment), an ileostomy, an ileostomy reversal, and a PDA ligation (which paralysed one of my vocal cords). There may have been one more surgery in there, too. I was born before 26 weeks, and am very thankful to be alive. Weighed 1 lb 13 oz when born. My brother was held off for 3 days (don't ask how, I don't know the way the medical professionals managed to do it) and fared significantly better than me, only needing lazer eye surgery.
That was my initial thought. Who could ever predict a bunch of Nazis would come up with a drug that was so powerful that we know which birth defect occurred on which day of gestation?
"Former nazi" doesn't really mean anything. It's like saying "former democrat/republican" when referring to Americans. Everyone in Germany was under the umbrella and influence of the government.
@InteriorDesignStudent everyone in Germany was a nazi basically if your definition of a nazi is someone who is under the influence of the nazi government, even kids.
As a classically trained Bass/Baritone singer, Thomas Quasthoff has been a great source of inspiration. I never knew that his condition was the result of this drug. To know this backstory makes me admire and respect him even more.
Ms. Kelsey is a hero. I am happy she was recognzied for her determination and hard work. It would be great if her story was part of pharmacy and medical school training.
My grandmother refused to take it when she was pregnant with my aunt and my mother. They were stationed overseas at the time and the doctors were pushing it hard. But my grandmother who was nurse had a feeling about it and refused.
Not crazy at all, when you think about just how fast that little cluster of cells is dividing and defining its systems, cell types, and so much more.....after those early days, its pretty much just refining the defined function, so harm done is likely to be more limited. I am tremendously thankful that today, we have the ability to do the proper research, over reasonable time, before drugs are deemed safe...and that their approval is always rescindable if they prove to be a problem.
@@RICDirector You mean that parasitic little piece of flesh? Naw, it can't be doing all those things that make it a total human boy or girl in a very small package in just 9 short months.
It’s all to do with embryology, the way the tiny foetus grows. It’s well worth looking into, as it’s really fascinating! Comparative embryology is amazing as well: embryos of very different species go through similar stages before differentiating into their final form. Pregnancy in any animal (mammal) is an everyday miracle, just amazing.
I could never understand when there are these late apologies, the original people isn't working there and maybe not even alive, so the apologies doesn't mean anything, its like getting hit by a car, and a random person on the street come up to you 1 month later and apologies on behalf on the person that hit you.
I was born in late 1957 and my mother was very sick in early pregnancy. My father was a doctor in a local hosital and was told by a colleague that there was a new 'wonder drug', not on the market yet but available if my mther wanted to try it. I've always been very pleased that she didn't.
when my mom was training to be a nurse (early 1970's), this was a big topic in her lessons on pregnancy and care of infants, babies, and children. she only cared for one person with the disorder, due to his parents working in West Germany at the time. thalidomide is now used here in the US for cancer patients. not only does it help with nausea, but also it prevents the growth of blood vessels which stops tumors from growing. however, you either must abstain from sex or the patient and their partner must use two forms of birth control.
I am a Thalidomide baby. I was lucky though. My mom took it only once and my thumbs and big toes are messed up as well as my spine. But I am fully mobile.
So after some googling- Thalidomide was not sold in Czechoslovakia BUT there were still cases here because it was smuggled here-just as many other medicine was (for example my greatgrandmother survived for few months longer just because my family was able to smuggle cancer medicine in the country. They unfourtenetly were not able to smuggle more and she died but ways how people get medicine to the country is really interesting topic)
My grandma, who was pregnant with my dad in 1958 was advised to take this by her doctor, but refused. Her refusal more than likely saved my dad, and in turn me and my 2 sisters, and again in turn my dads 4 grandchildren.
With a 40% chance of dying soon after birth, yes, maybe your family was saved by your grandma’s decision. But with a 60% chance of survival, and survivors going on to live full and active lives despite (or even because of - who knows how a disability shapes a person’s character?) their disabilities, you and your family could well be here, regardless. (But I take your point! You must be very grateful to your grandma!)
Lebanon, Charles de Gaulle, California baseball, Starkweather homicide, CHILDREN OF THALIDOMIDE ... (I can't be the only one to think of Billy Joel, right?)
Every time I hear the word Thalidomide I think of We Didn't Start the Fire. For a lot of us who were young kids in the 80s, it was how we learned about it (and many other events as well).
Thank you so much for covering this topic. I recently saw a video going viral about a woman who was unable to get a medication because she was of fertile age, even though she was not pregnant. Everyone who commented immediately jumped on the "war on women" wagon, but I realized that this is the exact reason why it happens. Doctors don't want this happening again.
This was mentioned in the video, and there is no irony at all. Many drugs were not available in East Germany and eastern Europe during cold war. This was not because they cared for the safety of the patients.
The comment regarding the new safety measures the pharma industry takes before releasing new medication did frustrate me a bit. In September 2022 I got my second COVID shot, 40 minutes later when I was right at my appartment door I collapsed. I'm still not over the hill, but for one and a half year I was permanently exhausted and my resting heart rate was usually over 100. I'm getting better. The permanent exhaustion is still there, but it's almost as it was back before my second COVID shot. Unfortunatelly the whole experience (when I collapsed I felt like I'd about to die) and all the other issues that followed for many months made me develop panic attacks, because when the exhaustion was still at it's fullest I felt every day like I might die soon because I was so weak and it got worse and worse for months at first. Now I can't even leave the house anymore because of all of this. I know, these kids/people here in the video had it way worse. I just wanted to say that untested in this case vaccines were still a thing recently. And it didn't go well for people like me. Took me 7 doctors to even find one that actually tried to check what's wrong with me. The first 6 didn't even take me serious or looked at me when I explained what I had and when it started. And as a result I will most likely not take any pills or vaccines anymore in the near future. After this experience I just don't trust these people anymore.
I knew of the Thalidomide crisis but not of its unsavory, sinister origins. The FDA official who went out of her way to stop it's distribution here in the US got solid gold in her the Karma meter.
And it's all because of the right-handed version of the molecule, Thalidomide is chiral meaning it forms in both a left- and right-handed version of the molecule during production, 50% being the safe and effective left-handed version, and 50% being the toxic right-handed version. Separating the two version of the molecule is extremely difficult, with methods of doing this at the lab scale only being developed in recent years.
@@indy_go_blue6048 They didn't know at the time; they should have done more testing before they started to give it out like candy to pregnant women. It spawned a whole new field of research into the toxic effects of drugs.
I was on this medication for over a year and a half. I have a rare form of leukemia and it was helping maintain my hemoglobin levels. I had to stop talking it in May as it was starting to cause nerve damage.
My mum who never smoked or drank was offered this in the early 60s when she was having my brother. I mention the drinking and smoking part because those suggestions were also offered to her when she had her checks ups and was crippled with morning sickness( she still went to work 👀) She said the doctor kept on trying to shove this drug on her but something inside her said no this is weird and why is he being so pushy and condescending. Now bear in mind she was a working class female , married to a black man living in the council estate areas. She said to me , “they were trying to kill us poor people off” My parents knew it then , my mum also said the ‘posh’ people she worked for never heard of the drug because they weren’t offered it . My mum and dad are 82/83 now. Still going strong and none of my mates believe they’re older than their 60s , fit and healthy. They brought us up not to trust pharmakia and I respect them for that. Brother is in his 60s fit as a fiddle and there’s 7 of us , I’m one of the youngest at 40. I viscerally remember my mum crying watching the news in the 90s about government finally accepting what they did was wrong and I’ll never forget what she said “it didn’t have to happen , those babies didn’t have to go through that, they were trying to kill us”. Absolutely disgraceful. And people still followed suit with their lies this past four years, nothing ever changes . This was in the U.K.
@@user-ee5ve3kv4vexactly . My parents were enraged when I told them my job was requiring me to get the job or I’d have to be laid off. That was a crime against humanity. So many still suffering the last four years. Stay safe, your body is already a natural healer.
@@user-ee5ve3kv4vDon’t be so utterly ridiculous & ignorant! The Covid jab is the reason millions of people are walking around as normal now and that Covid is no longer putting people in ICU ffs! Anti Covid vaxxers make me laugh, you’re all fine to be in public, enjoying the herd immunity thanks to EVERYONE ELSE taking the jab but won’t take it yourself! Yet I’m pretty sure you’ll eat packaged food with no idea of the contents and would quite happily take any other type of medication - despite also having no idea what it contains - yet not the Covid jab because you think it’s ‘fashionable’ to be against it! 😂 If they hadn’t created the Covid vaccine then millions more people would be dead right now and we certainly wouldn’t free to live our lives as normal again! And before you try arguing this or ‘laughing’ remember that the vast, vast majority of society took the Covid jab and yet here we are, no longer locked down, life is back to normal with now only mild strains of Covid….. Funny that!?!
That statement at the end is--clearly not going to undo the damage, but--a breath of fresh air to hear from a corporation. Often stories like these seem to end in no human connection, no accountability, no remorse. That sentiment in that statement is how more companies should be.
Maybe. I don't know. That bit about "we didn't reach out for 50 years because we were so shocked" rings extremely hollow, though. Corporate words are cheap, especially when no action is associated.
@@GolemCC The action had already happened. External auditors had determined how much compensation Grünenthal was able to pay without ending the company in the 1960s, and that sum was paid. Even more important, clinical trials became mandatory for drug approval, as mentioned in the video.
@@marvinidler2289 For over 20,000 lives forever changed, it was not remotely enough. Either way we're discussing their modern response, which is lukewarm at best.
@@GolemCC I didn't say it was enough, just that there had been action. The people running the company now weren't even born when the desaster happened. What statement or action would you expect? Serious question. I have a relative with both arms affected by Contergan. He is a PhD and has raised a family, but I don't see how the mistakes made by many people at that time can be forgiven, or what a CEO who was born in 1970 could say or do to get it undone.
I ran a 10k race at Blackpool and one of the other runners was a guy who was a thalidomide baby. He did as well as i did in the race. Handicaps are often challenge to be overcome and this guy certainly did that.
Thankfully, Dr. Frances Oldham Kelsey took a stand against the FDA in the USA, refusing the release of Thalidomide from coming into the States. It is heartbreaking people had to endure the birth defects from this medication.
Great video! Thank you for choosing this topic. The problem with thalidomide is a little bit more complicated than the scope of this video. Thalidomide is actually a really good drug. The problem is that they didn't separate the different isomers. Once they identified this problem, bringing the drug back to market for nausea and vomiting associated with pregnancy was impossible due to the company's mishandling thw debacle and losing the publics trust.. "Thalidomide is a versatile molecule. It is a derivative of glutamic acid and it has a panorama of actions that includes specific and broad antiinflammatory, immune-modulatory actions and inhibition of angiogenesis. On the downside, one of its chiral enantiomers has notoriously been associated with teratogenesis. Thalidomide is a racemic mixture of two enantiomers rectus R- and sinister S- optical isomers. They are readily interchangeable, the R-isomer is a sedative and the S-isomer is a teratogen." Cureus. 2021 Feb; 13(2): e13140. Published online 2021 Feb 4. doi: 10.7759/cureus.13140
So after all these years they offer a lawyer-written nonapology. They don’t apologize for the drug; they apologize for staying silent for fifty years. Then they offer a flimsy excuse for staying silent. This is almost as disgusting as what happened fifty years ago.
Times change; I know, I’ve seen them do it! Our standards for behaviour of both individuals and companies are very different today than in the 1970s. It was a far more hierarchical and patriarchal society then than it is now. It’s the children, grandchildren and now great grandchildren of the men who ran Grünenberg at the time when Thalidomide was being sold who are being asked for and deciding on the wording of an apology. They have to look back at the past and try to understand the ‘mindset’ at the time and then issue a proper apology suited to our attitudes and beliefs today.
In The Netherlands this affair is known as the Softenon affair. (A trade name of the drug Thalidomide) The amount of victims in my country was limited because the drug was only available on a doctor's prescription.
i always see people saying they knew what the video was gonna be about before they clicked it or something of the sort, and im a lil happy that i am now one of those people.
Thank you Francis!! You saved thousands of innocent babies and families from harm, deformities and the financial struggles that come with having kids with medical conditions that weren’t well known at that time.
Wasn't one of the reasons the issues with Thalidomide were not anticipated was due to there being two versions of the molecule? Both were Thalidomide but their layout was different. One caused the horrific side effects, the other didn't. I may be confusing this with another drug scandal.
You're correct. I remember thalidomide being the example in one of my chemistry lectures about chirality (chemicals that have the same pieces but are mirror images structurally)
Australian here, my grandmother on my mum's side was affected by thalomide, her hand on one arm is very stunted. I had horrible morning sickness with both of my pregnancies and I am SO thankful at the advances made in this area.
i really appreciate you highlighting thalidomide survivors and their accomplishments, so often the focus is just on their disfigurements and the pain they went through, and not who they are as people. a wonderful video as always 💕
As someone born in the US in 1959, of course I’ve heard of Thalidomide, but I’d never realized how close I was to having experienced one of the birth defects-I never paid attention to the timeline until now. Frances Kelsey, it’s too bad you’re no longer alive to receive my thanks and the thanks of thousands of others born around this time.
I was thinking of the Thalidomide memorial in Cathays Park in Cardiff when I clicked on this. It's always been a sobering presence and it was an odd moment seeing it appear in the video. I sadly remember how in school in the 80s and early 90s 'flid' was sometimes used as an insult. It's hard to fully grasp what fear, anger and sadness this drug engendered.
It's sad that the health of women and others who can get pregnant has been (and often still is) totally secondary and unconsidered when it comes to medical testing.
My parent's first child died right after birth in 1962. My dad said he had short limbs. My mom would break down and cry 20+ years later. I read an article about Thalidomide in the Sunday parade section but didn't dare bring it up. I'm convinced that she took it and probably felt bad about it.
I am the product of thalidomide. Mama took it in 1960-61 while pregnant with me. I had legs that were like Forrest Gump, wore braces for six months. I had six toes on each foot. The doctor took the extras off when I was born. I did not have a second set (adult teeth). When my baby teeth fell out, I didn't have any coming in. My mother never forgave herself for these things that happened to me. It was not her fault, yet she suffered with the consequences. This drug was given out regularly to women in Houston Texas at the time. For all kinds of troubles. It was touted as safe and effective 😮 we all know how those words are thrown around. I'm a healthy old lady now, so I made it through that. Just wanted to tell my tale. Thanks for listening
Thanks for telling, miss. God bless.
@@g--stef4756God bless you too 😊
Thanks for sharing. God bless.
Thank you for your story. I too was born in Houston, way after the thalidomide tragedy, but I became familiar with it when one of the teachers at my high school told us why she had braces on her legs. I shudder to think what you went through.
Why did doctors in Houston give this drug to women if it wasn't FDA approved ? How did they get hold of it ?
Aussie here. My brother was born in 1960, and I was born in 1962, right in the middle of when Thalidomide was available to pregnant women for morning sickness. It was offered to my Mum, but she was a nurse and she knew that anything she took, we took. So she declined. Thanks Mum ❤
That’s a great mom. Cheers bud.
awesome
Same here my mother refused this and I was born ok but one girl in my school was not so lucky. This shows why drug testing has to be so meticulous.
@@royconestoga7326 Yeah, she's awesome. We actually talked a lot about it when we were old enough to understand the horrors, and she couldn't believe how close she was.......
@@kevinsmyth364 Oh that's so sad. But I'm happy it turned out for you.
The really sad thing is that people with deformities from Thalidomide were (generally) treated so badly back then
My grandmother asked her doctor about this pill when she was expecting her first or second child, but he refused to issue it to any patient. This was because he had read some of the literature about the pill and its mechanisms, and was gravely concerned by the lack of a critical study or any testing. He was influential in the area, so none of the other doctors would issue it locally. The man deserved a medal.
Smart guy, good doctor
Me with the Covid vaccine. I am perfectly fine with vaccines that have years of testing and approval. Not animal trials or one year. Maybe it's fine, but I'm not going to risk it, especially for free to be an unpaid trial. If I'm going to suffer heath conditions, I'm getting some compensation.
@@moomyung9231 Thalidomide is NOT A VACCINE. Pills are totally different from vaccines, and any serious effects of a shot are typically instant or within hours. The entire medical R&D process was completely changed following Thalidomide, and this is why there has not been a repeat of it.
The mRNA science behind two of the COVID-19 vaccines has been around for years even though this was the first successful use of it. The non-mRNA vaccines for COVID-19 use traditional methods and mechanisms that have been in use for 70 and more years, and successfully eradicated Smallpox, and nearly eliminated Polio and Measles (if people would just take the goddamn shots!).
The COVID-19 vaccine roll out was one of the most successful treatments of any disease in human history, and would have probably eliminated it completely if it had been done at a greater scale. As it is, billions of doses were safely administered in a very short span of time, and there have been no confirmed examples of any lasting harm from it.
@@moomyung9231 I get your sentiment, but there has now been an incredibly high influx of research since the pandemic started. There is an incredible amount of literature thus far with the current vaccine being derived from the KP.2 strain that went around early spring 2024. I would consider taking a look at the literature for yourself
@@moomyung9231 I got the Pfizer 2 shot vaccine 2 years ago and have been fine, my sister got it and was fine, and my parents both got the Johnson & Johnson vaccines and only my father had any form of side effects which was just being tired for a few days after.
I know that this is anecdotal evidence, and not solid proof that the vaccines are safe, but, I hope even this small amount of evidence could even slightly make you feel better about vaccination, because, it helps, I know it helps, because when I did get covid after that, the symptoms were just, "ow my throat hurts and I'm a bit sleepy," for a week.
It's kind of weird, finding out your life was saved by someone you have never even heard of...thank you Frances Kelsey.
don't forget to thank the tens of thousands of us that were warning you all not to get the convid injections.
@@mustaffa1611There are a million new infections a day again. How many of those are your personal share of the fault? Every few days you are statistically responsible and every few months you are responsible for someone's death. I hope you can live with that. The vack seens (forbidden word) are proven safe and have been since day 1.
@@mustaffa1611 That has literally nothing to do with the video.
@@Bloomkyaaa go cry to someone who cares
@mustaffa1611 You conveniently forget that our ERs were jammed and morgue were overflowing. My cousin, a nurse, died of Covid and left a husband and three grieving children behind who struggle to this day. Shame on you for making a global pandemic fit your political stupidity in only the United States. A disease doesn't care what your politics are. People were too busy dying.
I am an American Thalidomide Survivor. My mother was an RN in New Martinsville, WV, and one of the doctors where she worked said it would improve her morning sickness so that she could continue to work. She only took 3 doses over the course of 1 week. I was born with all my fingers fused and my fingers are only 1 digit long. My hands were surgically “corrected” by a hand specialist at Northwestern University in Chicago. I am grateful and blessed to have become an RN myself. I am now retired. I never asked for accommodations or claimed any disability, but I regret that now. I wish I was more vocal and active vs. “normalizing” and ignoring my birth defects.
It's so important that you specified that you regret not asking for more compensation and help. Too often, I see people being praised for not complaining or demanding compensation even when they have every right to do so, and that just increases the already significant social pressure on others to struggle on alone in silence. I think there's a human compulsion to glorify self-denial and martyrdom, even when it causes more harm than good. It's a big part of why it can be so hard to "complain" about legitimate injustices. It's often socially easier to be one of the "good ones"- someone with a disability (or from an otherwise underprivileged group) who grins and bears it instead of speaking up or putting their foot down when they are treated poorly. Hopefully, that culture will continue to change. Nobody should feel ashamed for needing extra aid to have a chance at a level playing field with the "normal" people. Can an underprevileged person become successful with nothing but stoic grit and determination? Of course, some people can- and it's undeniably impressive. But they shouldn't have to, and it certainly shouldn't be framed as somehow righteous or morally superior.
I'm so sorry your Mum was so poorly supported by her colleagues - I am so disappointed by the lack of critical thought from the doctors who should have at least tried to know better. I'm sorry that you didn't get the kinds of support you were totally entitled to and deserved - it shouldn't have been something you were made to fight for. And the societal shaming that tells people to ask for less is insidious and awful - being able to recognise it is hard. I hope you can get what you need easily now. Each and every nurse deserves the world already.
Why did you put corrected in quotes? Does that mean the operation was largely unsuccessful ?
@@thebigrussian The surgeons said it was successful, in their opinion, but my mobility is severely limited and my functional ability has always been impaired.
I am so sorry that happened to you! I hope you are doing good!
Thalidomide, a medication disaster so huge it's single handedly result in an entirely new drug classification system.
Yes, thalidomide changed clinical research.
I worked for pharmaceutical companies in the clinical research department.
There I learned the importance of clinical trials on humans.
In the past new drugs were studied on men, young, healthy men in prison or military.
"Just trust the science you anti-semitic conspiracy theorist!!!"
@@whiteyfisk9769 That is not a fair comparison whatsoever. Don't try to piggyback your views off of this.
@@whiteyfisk9769have some self respect
@@whiteyfisk9769 Part of the story though is the fact that they've learned from it. Science is not perfect, but still leagues above any religion or conspiracy theories you can come up with.
That lady with the FDA is a hero, wow.
She was roundly vilified at the time, but I shudder to think how widely the consequences would have been felt if she hadn't stuck to her personal and scientific principles.
Definitely. There are heroes that go above and beyond to ensure that medical science is held to high standards and, for example, to keep people from being taken advantage of by charlatans promoting anti-parisitic drugs and horse dewormer for a recent virus.
For real!
@@sarahmacintosh6449 Another woman (alice Stewart) who found evidence of various fetal and post fetal effects due to xrays was criticized and her studies were extremely unpopular.. I was born in 1958 with a congenital defect in a ureter, which eventually destroyed a kidney, and my mother always told me that she suspected that it could have been a side effect of too many xrays.
If we still had someone like her around we wouldn't be having all these FDA recalls right now
My mother narrowly escaped being a Thalidomide baby because it was offered to my Grandma during her pregnancy in the late 50’s. Luckily my grandma is well known for not liking to take pills so she refused it
Good on your Gran
Nowadays if you dare question anything that would be going into your body, you get treated as the spawn of satan.
I am one of those lucky babies too..59 yrs old now. My mother had a prescription for these pills but she ate green apples instead as she said she always stopped feeling sick after eating a green apple and she craved them.
Smart woman. I'm thankful I refused to coof shots.
@@blu4085 Ngl, Green Apples are a mood lol.
Terrifying how it essentially took this disaster for doctors to even consider that something a pregnant woman consumes could have an impact on the unborn child
Rememebr when they used to hand out things like meth and cocaine?
They just... assumed. Assumptions are truly the most dangerous things.
That's just how science works, I think people put it on some magical pedestal of greatness, but really most of it is accidents and tragedies.
We can't know something exists until it is observed, sadly in this case, it wasn't observed until babies were being born deformed.
@@bruhtholemew less so that they assumed, more so they didn't consider it or care. It is easy to see with hindsight what wasn't even on the radar at the time. It is also impossible to consider every possible outcome...and even if you could do so, you couldn't know for sure you didn't miss one.....and there is also that they may just not have cared.
Humanity has a long and tragic history of assuming things are safe until they aren't.
That woman at the FDA is the embodiment of true public service. She put people's health and well-being ahead of all other considerations. I wish there were more like her.
they'd be prosecuted and/or suicided if they would do that today
I wish i can be more like her
Sadly the FDA is owned by Big Pharma now.
There are plenty like here. Sadly today, they are demonized.
Too bad it's been taken over the pharm@ industry.
Imagine being the FDA and YOU having to do the effort to NOT approve a drug. Not the manufacturer having to do the work to convince an official state body that the drug is safe.
Good point
They took saccharine off the market in the 70s because of the damage it does.
People fought hard for years FOR it. The FDA finally caved and approved it again.
We HAD people who cared.
But the general populace is freaking stupid.
nowadays they let the companies do their own safety testing, which has not turned out well at all, but we haven't been able to get that practice reversed yet. the battle continues, between corporate greed vs best medical practices.
@@johnsheppard314It’s really disturbing that we can have all these medicines advertised with awful side effects. “Hey are you depressed? Try this drug! By the way, one of the side effects is more depression!”
I'd imagine it would cost a lot of money for the FDA to test each new drug, especially at volume
The only thalidomide child I saw was a doctor in her late 40s treating my acne. A very kind person, open about her condition. I didn't think much of it back then but my mother was very impressed at how strong and dextrous her stump hands were, able to grab heavy textbooks, flipping through them with ease and nimbly handling the instruments she used on me. An inspiring case of a person not deterred by their defect and I find myself thinking about her a lot and every time thalidomide is brought up.
And I hope that she is doing well
We had a friend at church--we're in the US but she was British--who had an incomplete left arm because of thalidomide. She could do pretty much anything that didn't need really fine pinching dexterity (and most of those things she just learned to do with her other hand).
Stump hands. Hehe.
@thelunchlady8276 . Not funny. Idiot.
Thalidomide has antisngeogenic effects, which means it can prevent blood vessels from forming. That is why the limbs were shortened and deformed in babies. These days, we use this to our advantage in multiple myeloma treatment as well as treatment for Hansen's disease (leprosy). Doctors are still working on directly microdosing certain tumors with it, to try to prevent the tumor's continued growth (cut off the blood supply, and the tumor may stop growing or shrink). This is generally tried on tumors that are difficult to operate on, and must be done carefully so as not to cause tumor lysis syndrome.
Thank goodness for Frances Kelsey using the bureaucracy to put a stop to a risk to children in the US, so that we could reevaluate thalidomide for more appropriate uses later.
What wasn't mentioned in the documentary was that there WERE reports and research that implied that there were negative effects quite early in, but the head of the company and his buddies had that shut up in the manner they were used to doing on the good old days. It wasn't just the issue that no negative results were seen in animal trials. It's a big reason why there was such a huge stink afterwards.
@raquellofstedt9713 Of course. They just wanted to make money. There was a reason that the drug was abandoned before they purchased it and put it to market. There are plenty of drugs that are originally tested for one purpose, but determined to be much better suited for another purpose (minoxidil, sildenafil, etc.). I'm sure that there were teratogenic effects noted in test animals, but they probably figured they would be selling it for headaches and as a sleep aid, so no big deal. When it took off for morning sickness, they probably saw visions of cash and just kept quiet, hoping that, since humans were bigger, it wouldn't have the same effect.
I work as a nurse on a BMT unit, our MM patients receive a long education from a pharmacist, and sign an acknowledgement before we administer it. Oddly, we don’t give the same education when we administer the lethal dose of Melphlan pre transplant, and it literally kills you, every time.
@@namblor Hello, BMT nurse! I'm in Cellular Therapy!
The future is CAR-T!
I have seen Thalidomide covered so many times, and have rarely if ever seen the accomplishments of survivors discussed. You are quickly becoming my new standard for documenting these tragedies. Bravo 👏
He (FH)is the best!
Really impressed with how he handled such a sensitive topic as well. All love. And his narration has developed a pretty authoritative presence, which makes it even better.
I was born healthy in 1961. Thanks to a relative.
Mum was very sick with me so the doctor prescribed thalidomide.
Mum can home and got a glass of water and was about to take the first pill when it was slapped out of her hand, the lady doing the slapping was,a matron on a maternity ward. She said" if you want a healthy baby don't take that" grabbed the box and threw it in the bin.
Wow
Wow! You're very lucky to have had someone around that picked up on the pattern before it was discontinued. That's a very close call.
Your relative possibly saved your life. ❤
I will always be grateful for the full life I have lived, i have been a professional driver since 1979 when I joined the British Army then I went on to drive buses and coaches till 2020 when I finally realised I was getting older. I now drive a taxi taking special needs kids to school.
Without her intervention I could possibly been needing help not giving it.
I always thank her for being aware of the small lives she supervised.
That happened
The BBC drama _Call the Midwife_ dealt with this (season 4 or 5, I think).
The physician who supports the midwives had been prescribing Distaval/Thalidomide left and right because it had been advertised as safe, effective, and all his patients were singing its praises.
Now understand, this physician was very conscientious, sympathetic, and compassionate. He was no pill pusher. He was the doctor _everyone_ wishes they had.
The scene where he starts getting the reports from Germany that all is not well with this drug was heartbreaking. He sent all the midwives out to collect all the Distaval/Thalidomide that had been dispensed "...every last pill!" But without alarming the patients.
...and then the reluctance of some of the pregnant women to give up the pills. "...but they work great! They're the only thing that has helped my morning sickness!"
Don't forget Baby Susan! She and her mother become recurring characters after Baby Susan is born with all four limbs stunted by Thalidomide. Possibly giving away a disabled child and dealing with lackluster prosthetics are part of the plot.
This was actually how I initially learned about thalidomide. I was hanging out with my mum at a hotel she was staying at for a work conference and this episode happened to be playing on TV. While she wasn't old enough to even be part of the tragedy as a baby, she had learned a lot about it as a nurse and she explained everything she knew about it to me.
I was about to say about the episode of called midwives as well. They did Justice to the material that they were given and seeing the episode it made me wonder how many of those babies died as a result of the actions of the mother's or the nurses rather than the drug itself?
The show dealt with the subject so well. Heartbreaking but brilliant storytelling.
I knew about it before watching CtM but i never really thought about the mental health implications for the GPs who prescribed it in good faith. Dr Turners ongoing issues regarding his guilt is one of my favourite arcs in the show because of this reason.
Thanks for including the segment on successful survivors. One of the big problems with countering eugenicist rhetoric is that ablebodied people vastly underestimate the quality of life that disabled people have. Quite often if you try to get them to put themselves in the shoes of someone with a severe disability they can't do it and genuinely believe they would rather be dead, even though studies show that most people who acquire severe longterm injuries or illnesses actually adjust quite well and will sometimes even say that they're happier afterwards due to how their perspective has changed, while of course those born with deformities and injuries never knew anything different and tend to be just as happy as people born without X-ray vision are. Obviously no one's advocating for arbitrarily crippling people just to make them disabled, but it's hard to even convince people that our lives have value.
It's sad how widespread ableism still is and likely will be for way too long (it's already been terribly long)
My Mom contracted polio at age 5 in the early 1950s. The doctors didn't expect her to survive...much less have any kind of a normal life. She did. She walked, even though they said she wouldn't...she graduated from school...she got married and she had 4 kids. And, she was almost always the most cheerful and optimistic person in the room. She decided that being grateful for what she had was far more enjoyable than lamenting what she had lost or what could have been. I also learned a great deal of independence and self-sufficiency from her. Her own mother taught her at an early age that she wouldn't always be around to help and that she would need to learn to do things on her own and in her own way. And she practiced that every day of her life!
I think birth defects are bad, actually
@@PlasmafoxWell yeah, of course they’re bad. I am still capable of living a full life regardless of mine and so are millions, probably a billion other people too.
Incredibly well said. I have severe chronic pain due to a birth defect that was surgically corrected, and while I do carry a lot of anger for how “easy” life must be for everyone else, it’s interesting to look back at my life and trace the man I’ve become because of my pain. It takes so much more strength to find happiness in the midst of struggle than it does when everything is easy.
As a fan of Call The Midwife I knew this was gonna suck, cause frankly there's no good way to tell this story.
Well done telling this horrific story so well and thoroughly.
Bless Kelsey for holding her ground. sadly I don't think we (the US) would have been spared if something like this happened now.
I was hoping someone would bring up Call the Midwife! Those were some heartbreaking episodes.
Were the US spared from the covid vaccines? You can know that you are right!
I love when people learn things by reading or watching fiction.
Someone already said it but yeah, Americans were made into Guinea pigs during the pandemic with the jab. It was a lie that Pfizer did enough testing before sending these out to the entire country. Wish I wasn’t fear mongered into accepting two doses myself.
@johndoe-so2ef only difference being 60 years of developing safer medicine 😮😮😮
The series “Call The Midwife” has a story arc about a little girl who is born without arms due to thalidomide. The series touches on her life for a few years, and the heartbreaking reactions of others. The doctor who prescribed the drug was devastated to think he had prescribed something that had such a horrific side effect. It’s a BBC series, and on Netflix in the US.
Every time someone complains about the length of time it takes the FDA to approve medications, I think about Ms Kelsey and how much she fought to keep Thalidomide off American shelves. We were lucky to have her.
Sad that we had other drugs, on America shelves.
I found it particularly interesting that, depending on what day you took (or started) the drug affected the type of deformity. Thank you for this (as usual) excellent video.
I found this interesting too, I didn’t find I was pregnant until a week after my missed period so I was 5 weeks when I found out, the 21 days would be 3 weeks so many women probably didn’t even know they were pregnant when they took it, very sad
I’ve heard that many thalidomide survivors now face hip, knee, and ankle issues because those joints were made to do things they weren’t meant to(using a foot to write, for example).
@@smittykins it’s just so awful that it happened, my heart breaks for the mothers and children involved
@@sarahfrith1984 But since it was prescribed for morning sickness they would have known or suspected they were pregnant to get the drug.
@@reedaharris1341 they wouldn’t have had early tests in those days to know at 3 weeks, I guess maybe they suspected or hoped they were pregnant before their missed period
A doctor I've visited has displays with bottles and packages from various medicines from the 40's-70's that have very unique looks to them. I asked if any of them ever worked, and he IMMEDIATELY started going off on how dangerous many of them were. Even outside this Thalidomide drug, many of those medicines just weren't worth taking at all.
And nothing has changed.
@@Firevine Truth. 👏👏👏👏
The same lady at the FDA who kept thalidomide from entering the US later reexamined other drugs being sold in the 60s and 70s and showed that they also caused more subtle cognitive birth defects and cancer, which were not noticed for many years. I wish we had more educated regulators able to look at the big picture effects of common environmental poisons
@@Firevine I remember an anti-depressant ad on TV about 15 years ago that listed "increased risk of death" as a side effect.... wut? There was another that was "increased risk OF pregnancy"... hunh? didn't list that it had an effect WHILE preg.... "risk OF".... hunh?
Things are better now. Pfizer say so
Suddenly that line "children of thalidomide" in Billy Joel's "We Didn't Start the Fire" makes disturbing sense
His song lyrics cover a myriad of situations and emotions.
@@rubyharris4422 Belgians in the Congo!
He's the reason I knew what thalidomide was. I got curious and looked it up one day. Thank you, Mr Joel.
Well what, otherwise you thought he just made it up? 😅
@@silver-berry Just didn't know the context.
Thank you for this video. I watch your videos religiously but this is the first one that relates to me personally. My grandmother took Thalidomide while pregnant with my uncle, and he was born with a stunted arm. We also think that he had an esophageal defect caused by thalidomide, that contributed to his early death due to asphyxiation. My aunt won a lawsuit for wrongful death because he was neglected in the ER while having difficulty breathing. Our medical system failed him, twice. I didn’t know him very well but I remember he was very positive and kind, just a great guy. Thanks for spreading awareness about this!
I'm sorry your uncle was affected. God bless you all. 💙
Anyone else notice that the 50-years-too-late apology by Greunenthal was the most non-apology ever? I recognize that the people running that company today are not the ones responsible in the 50s and 60s, but the apology did not admit any wrongdoing, even on the part of their predecessors.
Completely agree. But I suppose: "What do you expect, they were Nazis" isn't much of an apology either.
It’s absolutely crazy how long it took us to learn such seemingly obvious things. Of course anything ingested by a pregnant mother has the potential to affect her baby. The mother is where the baby gets all of their nutrients.
Things aren't "obvious" until it is known. In 20 years people will look at 2020 in the same way. 2/3 or more took and new untested "medication".
Agreed. Even though my mother was a smoker and daily wine drinker, she knew to abstain from both when she was pregnant.
Common sense versus learned men.
Especially when it comes to womens health: keep your common sense. Medical support is several hundred years behind in they're learning.
We didn't learn
We are still doing it with pregnant people and otherwise. They don’t do anything until it causes massive complications and people are outraged.
I worked with a lady who was a victim of Thalidomide. She was born with a stunted right arm.
My late friend was lied to about her daughter. Told it was a brain malformation. . Never believed it was caused by the Thalidomide
@@lifewuzonceezrI was born after it was banned but knew a kid who may have got the effects on her arms via mother.
@@lifewuzonceezr How was the connection to Thalidomide discovered?
Wow
@@mph1ish The shear number of children born with undeveloped arms and legs. I'd bet they did animal testing to pinpoint the connection. Probably Resis monkeys.
Friendly reminder that before 1993 women were rarely included in pharmaceutical trials.
Pathologies often are misdiagnosed in women because they don't present with the 'classical' (aka men's) symptoms. Grandma was sent home with antacids when she had a heart attack and the advice to chill by her GP (no chest/arm pain, she was nauseous and had shortness of breath), woman client was refused a sleep study because 'she didn't snore so it can't be sleep apnea'
Your compassion for, and elevation of survivors of tragedy is unmatched. I’m here for the horror, but stay for the kindness.
"I'm here for the horror, but stay for the kindness."
I really like that.
The fda standing firm on not approving a medication despite massive pressure from the pharmaceutical companies
oh so they were able to hold their ground at one point
Well, one woman in the FDA held her ground. Had someone else picked it up instead of her, would there have been the same resistance? I guess we'll never know
Yes, when fda was not a pharma branch. Now fda execs and pens execs are the same, and 80%+ of its budget comes from pharma.
Back then most people had some common sense and morals.
@@liberteus That's because our republican representatives keep cutting their budget to operate!! "We are saving you money on your taxes." So we can thank them!!
@@rf159a youre a fool if you think if you still believe in partisan politics.
Frances Kelsey is a person I didn’t know about, and certainly one I will remember.
Your videos have so much important information.
Growing up in West Germany, I met several Contergan survivors in my life. One of them worked at my bank until very recently, when she retired.
The fact that Contergan was not available in East Germany and elsewhere behind the Iron Curtain is part of what put researchers on the trail of what was causing the sudden spike in birth defects. Initially, they assumed it was fallout from nuclear tests, but radiation would not stop at the border, so there should have been a similar spike in cases in Eastern Europe.
As for Grünenthal, it's a good thing they apologised, even if it was fifty years too late. However, the compensation fund set up for German Contergan survivors, half of which was paid by Grünenthal and half by the (West) German government, has long been used up. Ongoing compensation for the survivors is now paid solely by the German government, while Grünenthal is off the hook. Now I can imagine worse uses for my taxes, but it still irks me that the company that actually caused the disaster is not longer paying compensation to the survivors.
While the drug is infamous, I was not previously aware of the history of the company that produced it. Chilling.
Same here, ther drug, yes. The company, no.
Just didn't think it could be worse. It was.
Who cares? It was a good medication, barring the whole pregnancy thing.
Just wait until.you learn about Operation Paperclip, or the history of unethical medical experiments in the USA. Those crimes were all the rage at that time, and not only in Germany.
I was also not aware but it somehow didn't surprise me
There's a thalidomide survivor named Tony Meléndez, who was born without arms and is famous for learning to play the guitar with his feet. He visited my childhood church to perform and we heard about his story. Back in the 80s, he performed for Pope John Paul II, who was so moved, he got up and hugged Meléndez. He also has a band called Tony Meléndez and the Toe Jam Band, which is hilarious. Very cool dude.
This is one of the best episodes you have done. I had never heard about the lady at the FDA. I grew up with three thalidomide children in my circle of friends and neighbors, all born without or with drastically shortened arms. My mother escaped it for a sad reason; she had already suffered two miscarriages and did not want to take anything that might risk another one. So her children were born without the struggles and stigma our "thali" friends went through. Thanks, Mom. I always thought you might be psychic.
13:02 a “sign of shock?” Unbelieveable that fifty years later, they wouldn’t admit the company was avoiding culpability and due punishment.
My college chem professor used this to teach a lesson on the arrangement of organic molecules. Two molecules with identical atoms in identical arrangements, but where some of the bonds are reflected, can have dramatically different reactions. In the case of Thalidomide, the molecule which relieves pain and suppresses nausea is entirely safe, but its reflected "twin" is an anti-angiogenic - that is, it suppresses the creation and growth of new blood vessels. Which, obviously, in a developing fetus, is going to cause problems. That same property was indeed used to treat Leprosy and studied as a treatment for some forms of cancer.
Of course the original manufacturing process didn't account for separating these distinct molecules, and likely there could have been a way or producing Thalidomide that didn't have horrific side effects, though it would have been much more expensive.
Another comment mentioned some work done to try and separate the types of molecules, but they found that the molecule "switched" back to the harmful form once in the body. Nasty stuff.
I remember in high school when my teacher showed us the molecules and asked if anyone knew what happened when they were used in medicine, I was the only one who knew because I had watched a documentary earlier that year. Thalidomide was banned in Brazil in 1962 iirc and the class happened in 2014, I was surprised that it wasn't talked about more often.
I was born in 1965 and remember seeing kids with these symptoms all the time as I was a child. We had a bad name for it that I won’t repeat. But obviously now, 50 years hence we all realize that it wasn’t the fault of the kids or their parents. But I grew up being afraid of people who were so affected and I wish I could apologize to them all. I never said it to anyone’s face. But people I knew would say this in secret and it certainly wasn’t flattering. I’m ashamed.
Makes me glad to have been born in the early 1950s.
Wow. Wasn't their parents fault either. Damn bully.
I know the word, and it's a word used in playgrounds copiously in the 70's and 80's. You are older and wiser, and had no malice as a kid I'm sure. Fear makes us do and say irrational things.
@@lallyjoel2536Yes they at least are willing to humble themselves and change for the better, most people throughout time and still today are ever so stubborn to continue harming.
@@LoralanthalasHence why they said it's now realized it's neither party's fault...?
It was different time. When she was expecting me, my Mum told me that expectant Mothers were taught that what ever the doctor gave you couldn't harm the baby as it couldn't cross the placental barrier. My Mum was offered it but refused to take it, as her philosophy was tablets couldn't beat good nursing, her friend took it and her daughter was born with a stunted arm on one side and a stunted leg on the other. She lived and had a family and her hair is grey as mine!
I'm a boomer, so I remember vividly about this scandal. Much appreciation to you, sir, for treating this with the dignity and compassion it deserves. Also, how you showed that these unintended victims of this horrific tragedy have gone on to live happy and productive lives.
A rare W for the FDA.
The only thing lacking from this video was an explanation _why_ such an apparent wonder drug like thalidomide had such a reaction on a fetus. I would have been very interested to hear the science behind what the drug actually does in a scientific sense.
Not a scientist or a doctor of any kind, but I remember reading somewhere that it inhibited cell growth/development. I do believe that it's used to treat some forms of cancer, but under extreme caution and supervision.
@@dawnstorm9768 Yeah, that was my guess. Which raises MASSIVE question about the mechanism behind how it had a beneficial effect. were adults actually having a similar issue, just less noticeable?
@@marhawkman303Someone mentioned that it affects blood vessel growth--you'll have to scroll further down to find it.
Like modern chemo, Thalidomide attacks fast growing cells such as cancer cells by inhibiting cell growth. If the cells can't grow, then they can't divide, and you don't get new cells. Desirable outcome if you want cancer cells to not be replaced. But fast growing areas of your body, like your hair or stomach lining, wear themselves out just as quickly.
Thalidomide helped with morning sickness as your stomach lining wouldn't grow as fast. Therefore your digestive tract would slow or shut down to prevent your stomach from digesting itself. This included peristalsis/digestive tract contractions. No contractions, nothing in your stomach, then no vomit.
it causes birth defects because a fetus is nothing but fast growing cells. They got attacked as well. If taken during the first trimester, miscarriage was inevitable. But mourning sickness is usually a 2nd trimester thing. By then the core of the baby is formed, and the extremities are being grown. Hence why Thalidomide victims would usually be missing limbs.
For adults, long term use would lead to similar issues to modern chemo: Baldness, loss of nails, and digestive issues. They would self-resolve in a few months by stopping the medication. But it was rarely used long term, as mourning sickness usually lasts only a month or two.
this is your answer (in part) from another commenter: ‘interestingly it was a mix of left and right-handed enantiomers of a chiral molecule. only one of which was reported to cause birth defects (l-thalidomide). attempts to isolate the r-thalidomide molecule were undertaken but were found to undergo chiral inversion to l-thalidomide in the body.’
"Safety is our number one priority" - Apparently no one in any industry.
That can be said in today's age as well and still be applicable.
Except for the Tobacco industry, they'll tell you their products are safe despite all evidence to the contrary.
@@SakuraAsranArtyou still pretend it's a big issue even though the entire world smoked and your lung cancer only went up 10%. Suprise! We all die from our circulatory system springing a leak or by abnormal cells taking over. Even the generations of nonsmokers. But hey! 10% less chance you'll die from abnormal cells on your lungs! 😂
Back then safety testing was basically stand with your arm out, palm up, and we put one drop on your hand. At 15 minutes if nothing happens, it's safe, start shipping. If after 15 minutes the test subject collapses, goes into convulsions bleeding from every bodily orifice--well it doesn't matter, it occurred outside the test procedure and the data will not be recorded, still safe. This of course is an exaggeration, but it shows the kind of attitude that was prevalent at the time. Products are safe until proven otherwise. Another example of regulation by body count. But how "many" bodies does it take?
That's because it sounds better than "we want to make a sh*tload of money". And most probably start out with good intentions. Even this stuff was very good for most people, just not for pregnant women.
Interestingly it was a mix of left and right-handed enantiomers of a chiral molecule. Only one of which was reported to cause birth defects (L-thalidomide). Attempts to isolate the R-thalidomide molecule were undertaken but were found to undergo chiral inversion to L-thalidomide in the body.
Research has resumed as the enantiomer's growth restricting properties show great potential in the treatment of tumours.
I was hoping someone would bring this up! I learned about this in my college organic chemistry class.
That's incredibly interesting.
As I recall the dextro [RH] version was produced in the pilot production almost, if not totally exclusive but the levo [LH] version was more prevelent during mass production.
Thank God for Frances Kelsey! I was born in the early sixties and my mom had terrible morning sickness but her doctor basically told her to eat saltines and suck it up
Suck it up is terrible advice for most things. If I didn't seek professional help for my morning sickness I would have died. She didn't let me ingest water & I was losing weight. I tried crackers & ginger ale & all the "tricks"
@janaharvey550 it is tough advice, but a lot of Dr's in the early sixties were tough on pregnant women. I was pregnant in early 90s with twins, which my Dr didn't realize until I was almost 6 months along. I was VERY sick and losing a little weight but those were the days of everything being as natural as possible and he basically told me to suck it up, but in nicer language.
@sharonsmith583 I looked it up number 1 cause of death for early term pregnancy was severe nausea until Iv fluids were invented. If I would have sucked it up I would have died. Good thing u were able too.
Dear Fascinating Horror, now that you are venturing into medical stories, may I suggest you review the case of oxygen, premature babies and retinopathy of prematurity? It all started when airtight neonatal incubators were developed as a result of technical advances during WW2. And it was the cause of Stevie Wonder’s blindness. It is a major reason why neonatologists (myself included) are so insistent that proper randomized controlled trials are carried out before ANY major change in treatment.
This. As the dad of two premies, it's a very fascinating story.
Premmie here, the humdicrib they used on me was prone to break down and did after i was declared OK to leave
Isn't that when they put too much oxygen in your incubator, which causes the blood vessels in your eyes to grow way too quickly, and then your retinas detach? Exactly what happened to me so I hope he covers it
Oh! I have that! I am luckily able to see, but my vision is extremely poor and I am unable to get lasik. I also had a myriad of problems which required lazer eye surgery (to stop retinal detachment), an ileostomy, an ileostomy reversal, and a PDA ligation (which paralysed one of my vocal cords). There may have been one more surgery in there, too. I was born before 26 weeks, and am very thankful to be alive. Weighed 1 lb 13 oz when born. My brother was held off for 3 days (don't ask how, I don't know the way the medical professionals managed to do it) and fared significantly better than me, only needing lazer eye surgery.
A group of former Nazis responsible for more pain and suffering, Who could have seen that coming? 🤨
if you believe that I have some newly abandoned homes in gaza to sell you.
That was my initial thought. Who could ever predict a bunch of Nazis would come up with a drug that was so powerful that we know which birth defect occurred on which day of gestation?
You know that most of germans had in some way supported the nazis and were allowed to live post ww2?
"Former nazi" doesn't really mean anything. It's like saying "former democrat/republican" when referring to Americans. Everyone in Germany was under the umbrella and influence of the government.
@InteriorDesignStudent everyone in Germany was a nazi basically if your definition of a nazi is someone who is under the influence of the nazi government, even kids.
As a classically trained Bass/Baritone singer, Thomas Quasthoff has been a great source of inspiration. I never knew that his condition was the result of this drug. To know this backstory makes me admire and respect him even more.
"As harmless as a sugar cookie...", said no diabetic.
...I mean, my diet doesn't affect my diabetes. 😂 Same thing happens if I eat a stick of celery or a sugar cookie, as far as that goes.
Ms. Kelsey is a hero. I am happy she was recognzied for her determination and hard work. It would be great if her story was part of pharmacy and medical school training.
My grandmother refused to take it when she was pregnant with my aunt and my mother. They were stationed overseas at the time and the doctors were pushing it hard. But my grandmother who was nurse had a feeling about it and refused.
It is absolutely *crazy* that different days can affect the birth defects in such predictable ways
Not different trimesters - different days
Not crazy at all, when you think about just how fast that little cluster of cells is dividing and defining its systems, cell types, and so much more.....after those early days, its pretty much just refining the defined function, so harm done is likely to be more limited.
I am tremendously thankful that today, we have the ability to do the proper research, over reasonable time, before drugs are deemed safe...and that their approval is always rescindable if they prove to be a problem.
@@RICDirector You mean that parasitic little piece of flesh? Naw, it can't be doing all those things that make it a total human boy or girl in a very small package in just 9 short months.
It’s all to do with embryology, the way the tiny foetus grows. It’s well worth looking into, as it’s really fascinating! Comparative embryology is amazing as well: embryos of very different species go through similar stages before differentiating into their final form.
Pregnancy in any animal (mammal) is an everyday miracle, just amazing.
I could never understand when there are these late apologies, the original people isn't working there and maybe not even alive, so the apologies doesn't mean anything, its like getting hit by a car, and a random person on the street come up to you 1 month later and apologies on behalf on the person that hit you.
I was born in late 1957 and my mother was very sick in early pregnancy. My father was a doctor in a local hosital and was told by a colleague that there was a new 'wonder drug', not on the market yet but available if my mther wanted to try it. I've always been very pleased that she didn't.
when my mom was training to be a nurse (early 1970's), this was a big topic in her lessons on pregnancy and care of infants, babies, and children. she only cared for one person with the disorder, due to his parents working in West Germany at the time.
thalidomide is now used here in the US for cancer patients. not only does it help with nausea, but also it prevents the growth of blood vessels which stops tumors from growing. however, you either must abstain from sex or the patient and their partner must use two forms of birth control.
Remaining silent for 50years never allowed most of those families to emotionally heal or receive any compensation. Compensation should be given.
I am a Thalidomide baby. I was lucky though. My mom took it only once and my thumbs and big toes are messed up as well as my spine. But I am fully mobile.
❤
Same here, messed up my spine and pelvis requiring hip replacements, but like you still fully mobile.
So after some googling- Thalidomide was not sold in Czechoslovakia BUT there were still cases here because it was smuggled here-just as many other medicine was (for example my greatgrandmother survived for few months longer just because my family was able to smuggle cancer medicine in the country. They unfourtenetly were not able to smuggle more and she died but ways how people get medicine to the country is really interesting topic)
My grandma, who was pregnant with my dad in 1958 was advised to take this by her doctor, but refused. Her refusal more than likely saved my dad, and in turn me and my 2 sisters, and again in turn my dads 4 grandchildren.
With a 40% chance of dying soon after birth, yes, maybe your family was saved by your grandma’s decision. But with a 60% chance of survival, and survivors going on to live full and active lives despite (or even because of - who knows how a disability shapes a person’s character?) their disabilities, you and your family could well be here, regardless. (But I take your point! You must be very grateful to your grandma!)
Funny coincidence, I was delivered by Dr McBride, and I only just recently learned he's also the father of whistle blower David McBride
As always, you have handled this subject in a respectful manner.
Lebanon, Charles de Gaulle, California baseball, Starkweather homicide, CHILDREN OF THALIDOMIDE ...
(I can't be the only one to think of Billy Joel, right?)
Uh huh, uh huh.
I immediately scrolled down to make sure before I repeated you.
Every time I hear the word Thalidomide I think of We Didn't Start the Fire. For a lot of us who were young kids in the 80s, it was how we learned about it (and many other events as well).
Search Billy Joel concert in Russian. What an ass. I have always hated him for Uptown girl.
Thank you so much for covering this topic. I recently saw a video going viral about a woman who was unable to get a medication because she was of fertile age, even though she was not pregnant. Everyone who commented immediately jumped on the "war on women" wagon, but I realized that this is the exact reason why it happens. Doctors don't want this happening again.
this channel is a masterclass at sharing source material. THANK you! It helps me go into rabbit holes!
Ironically, the drug was never approved for use in East Germany.
What a surprise.
@@GooseAlarm ... but ironically, a welcomed one.
This was mentioned in the video, and there is no irony at all. Many drugs were not available in East Germany and eastern Europe during cold war. This was not because they cared for the safety of the patients.
Soviets not approving a western drug, biggest surprise of the century (not)
It wasn’t approved in Amish communities either.
The comment regarding the new safety measures the pharma industry takes before releasing new medication did frustrate me a bit. In September 2022 I got my second COVID shot, 40 minutes later when I was right at my appartment door I collapsed. I'm still not over the hill, but for one and a half year I was permanently exhausted and my resting heart rate was usually over 100.
I'm getting better. The permanent exhaustion is still there, but it's almost as it was back before my second COVID shot. Unfortunatelly the whole experience (when I collapsed I felt like I'd about to die) and all the other issues that followed for many months made me develop panic attacks, because when the exhaustion was still at it's fullest I felt every day like I might die soon because I was so weak and it got worse and worse for months at first.
Now I can't even leave the house anymore because of all of this.
I know, these kids/people here in the video had it way worse. I just wanted to say that untested in this case vaccines were still a thing recently. And it didn't go well for people like me. Took me 7 doctors to even find one that actually tried to check what's wrong with me. The first 6 didn't even take me serious or looked at me when I explained what I had and when it started.
And as a result I will most likely not take any pills or vaccines anymore in the near future. After this experience I just don't trust these people anymore.
Ok Chuck McGill
I saw a lot of side effects after covid vaccine and there was a lot of pressure on prescribers not to do VAERS reports
Kudos to the midwife Pat Sparrow who noticed the correlation and alerted Dr McBride
This is one of the best documentaries I have seen about Thalidomide. Short but to the point and beautifully narrated.
I knew of the Thalidomide crisis but not of its unsavory, sinister origins. The FDA official who went out of her way to stop it's distribution here in the US got solid gold in her the Karma meter.
Thalidomide marketing: "It's as harmless as a sugar cookie!"
Diabetics: 😐
And it's all because of the right-handed version of the molecule, Thalidomide is chiral meaning it forms in both a left- and right-handed version of the molecule during production, 50% being the safe and effective left-handed version, and 50% being the toxic right-handed version. Separating the two version of the molecule is extremely difficult, with methods of doing this at the lab scale only being developed in recent years.
Damn, 50%. That's not even a safe gamble on a card game.
@@indy_go_blue6048 They didn't know at the time; they should have done more testing before they started to give it out like candy to pregnant women. It spawned a whole new field of research into the toxic effects of drugs.
I was on this medication for over a year and a half. I have a rare form of leukemia and it was helping maintain my hemoglobin levels. I had to stop talking it in May as it was starting to cause nerve damage.
Always look forward to seeing new videos from you. Thanks for the quality content, my dude.
My mum who never smoked or drank was offered this in the early 60s when she was having my brother.
I mention the drinking and smoking part because those suggestions were also offered to her when she had her checks ups and was crippled with morning sickness( she still went to work 👀)
She said the doctor kept on trying to shove this drug on her but something inside her said no this is weird and why is he being so pushy and condescending.
Now bear in mind she was a working class female , married to a black man living in the council estate areas.
She said to me , “they were trying to kill us poor people off”
My parents knew it then , my mum also said the ‘posh’ people she worked for never heard of the drug because they weren’t offered it .
My mum and dad are 82/83 now. Still going strong and none of my mates believe they’re older than their 60s , fit and healthy.
They brought us up not to trust pharmakia and I respect them for that.
Brother is in his 60s fit as a fiddle and there’s 7 of us , I’m one of the youngest at 40.
I viscerally remember my mum crying watching the news in the 90s about government finally accepting what they did was wrong and I’ll never forget what she said “it didn’t have to happen , those babies didn’t have to go through that, they were trying to kill us”.
Absolutely disgraceful.
And people still followed suit with their lies this past four years, nothing ever changes .
This was in the U.K.
$
@@user-ee5ve3kv4vexactly . My parents were enraged when I told them my job was requiring me to get the job or I’d have to be laid off.
That was a crime against humanity. So many still suffering the last four years.
Stay safe, your body is already a natural healer.
@@user-ee5ve3kv4vDon’t be so utterly ridiculous & ignorant! The Covid jab is the reason millions of people are walking around as normal now and that Covid is no longer putting people in ICU ffs! Anti Covid vaxxers make me laugh, you’re all fine to be in public, enjoying the herd immunity thanks to EVERYONE ELSE taking the jab but won’t take it yourself! Yet I’m pretty sure you’ll eat packaged food with no idea of the contents and would quite happily take any other type of medication - despite also having no idea what it contains - yet not the Covid jab because you think it’s ‘fashionable’ to be against it! 😂 If they hadn’t created the Covid vaccine then millions more people would be dead right now and we certainly wouldn’t free to live our lives as normal again! And before you try arguing this or ‘laughing’ remember that the vast, vast majority of society took the Covid jab and yet here we are, no longer locked down, life is back to normal with now only mild strains of Covid….. Funny that!?!
@@user-ee5ve3kv4vcovid vaccine not the same but keep pushing fear maybe polio, smallpox, covid, etc make a big comeback
@@user-ee5ve3kv4vthe covid vaccine doesn’t have any proven health risks to it though.
It’s interesting to note this drug is used to treat leprosy today
If it didn't have uses, it wouldn't have affected that many people.
Best corporate apology is financial compensation.
That statement at the end is--clearly not going to undo the damage, but--a breath of fresh air to hear from a corporation. Often stories like these seem to end in no human connection, no accountability, no remorse. That sentiment in that statement is how more companies should be.
Maybe. I don't know. That bit about "we didn't reach out for 50 years because we were so shocked" rings extremely hollow, though. Corporate words are cheap, especially when no action is associated.
@@GolemCC The action had already happened. External auditors had determined how much compensation Grünenthal was able to pay without ending the company in the 1960s, and that sum was paid. Even more important, clinical trials became mandatory for drug approval, as mentioned in the video.
@@marvinidler2289 For over 20,000 lives forever changed, it was not remotely enough.
Either way we're discussing their modern response, which is lukewarm at best.
@@GolemCC I didn't say it was enough, just that there had been action. The people running the company now weren't even born when the desaster happened.
What statement or action would you expect? Serious question.
I have a relative with both arms affected by Contergan. He is a PhD and has raised a family, but I don't see how the mistakes made by many people at that time can be forgiven, or what a CEO who was born in 1970 could say or do to get it undone.
@@marvinidler2289 why should they company not have been ended? Many places would end the life of a human being who had caused so much death.
This was a hard watch 😢
At 11:21 you can see this lab worker is wearing crocs
Best PPE 👌
I ran a 10k race at Blackpool and one of the other runners was a guy who was a thalidomide baby. He did as well as i did in the race. Handicaps are often challenge to be overcome and this guy certainly did that.
Always look forward to a Tuesday morning video by FH
Sameeee! I get up at 5 for work and I sit with my coffee and watch it on Tuesdays.
Thankfully, Dr. Frances Oldham Kelsey took a stand against the FDA in the USA, refusing the release of Thalidomide from coming into the States. It is heartbreaking people had to endure the birth defects from this medication.
Great video! Thank you for choosing this topic. The problem with thalidomide is a little bit more complicated than the scope of this video. Thalidomide is actually a really good drug. The problem is that they didn't separate the different isomers. Once they identified this problem, bringing the drug back to market for nausea and vomiting associated with pregnancy was impossible due to the company's mishandling thw debacle and losing the publics trust..
"Thalidomide is a versatile molecule. It is a derivative of glutamic acid and it has a panorama of actions that includes specific and broad antiinflammatory, immune-modulatory actions and inhibition of angiogenesis. On the downside, one of its chiral enantiomers has notoriously been associated with teratogenesis. Thalidomide is a racemic mixture of two enantiomers rectus R- and sinister S- optical isomers. They are readily interchangeable, the R-isomer is a sedative and the S-isomer is a teratogen."
Cureus. 2021 Feb; 13(2): e13140. Published online 2021 Feb 4. doi: 10.7759/cureus.13140
One of the more tragic stories you've covered. Some of your videos I watch in awe. This one made me feel very empty.
So after all these years they offer a lawyer-written nonapology.
They don’t apologize for the drug; they apologize for staying silent for fifty years. Then they offer a flimsy excuse for staying silent.
This is almost as disgusting as what happened fifty years ago.
Yes, that was one of the worst "apologies" I've ever heard.
Times change; I know, I’ve seen them do it! Our standards for behaviour of both individuals and companies are very different today than in the 1970s. It was a far more hierarchical and patriarchal society then than it is now. It’s the children, grandchildren and now great grandchildren of the men who ran Grünenberg at the time when Thalidomide was being sold who are being asked for and deciding on the wording of an apology. They have to look back at the past and try to understand the ‘mindset’ at the time and then issue a proper apology suited to our attitudes and beliefs today.
In The Netherlands this affair is known as the Softenon affair. (A trade name of the drug Thalidomide)
The amount of victims in my country was limited because the drug was only available on a doctor's prescription.
Indeed. 'Softenon kindjes"
I was born in 1961. I was lucky.
You are on of my very few favorite youtubers. I love all of your videos, especially your shorts! Excellent facts!
i always see people saying they knew what the video was gonna be about before they clicked it or something of the sort, and im a lil happy that i am now one of those people.
Congratulations! 🎉
Thank you Francis!! You saved thousands of innocent babies and families from harm, deformities and the financial struggles that come with having kids with medical conditions that weren’t well known at that time.
This is the most positive presentation of this series of scandals I have seen. Well done!
Wasn't one of the reasons the issues with Thalidomide were not anticipated was due to there being two versions of the molecule? Both were Thalidomide but their layout was different. One caused the horrific side effects, the other didn't. I may be confusing this with another drug scandal.
You're correct. I remember thalidomide being the example in one of my chemistry lectures about chirality (chemicals that have the same pieces but are mirror images structurally)
Apparently there was no way to give only one chirality
It's great that you covered this, I'm not sure how many people have even heard of this tragedy. Thanks for the upload!
Australian here, my grandmother on my mum's side was affected by thalomide, her hand on one arm is very stunted.
I had horrible morning sickness with both of my pregnancies and I am SO thankful at the advances made in this area.
i really appreciate you highlighting thalidomide survivors and their accomplishments, so often the focus is just on their disfigurements and the pain they went through, and not who they are as people. a wonderful video as always 💕
Learning about thalidomide many decades ago has always given me shivers.
Likewise! Thanks for watching!
As someone born in the US in 1959, of course I’ve heard of Thalidomide, but I’d never realized how close I was to having experienced one of the birth defects-I never paid attention to the timeline until now. Frances Kelsey, it’s too bad you’re no longer alive to receive my thanks and the thanks of thousands of others born around this time.
I was thinking of the Thalidomide memorial in Cathays Park in Cardiff when I clicked on this. It's always been a sobering presence and it was an odd moment seeing it appear in the video. I sadly remember how in school in the 80s and early 90s 'flid' was sometimes used as an insult. It's hard to fully grasp what fear, anger and sadness this drug engendered.
A horror story respectfully and calmly recounted. Thank you and well done sir.
Earilest I've been to one of your videos. Great as always!
It's sad that the health of women and others who can get pregnant has been (and often still is) totally secondary and unconsidered when it comes to medical testing.
Fr which is why even as a teen I was scared and nervous about taking birth control pills like my sister has
Others who can get pregnant? Other than women?
My parent's first child died right after birth in 1962. My dad said he had short limbs. My mom would break down and cry 20+ years later. I read an article about Thalidomide in the Sunday parade section but didn't dare bring it up. I'm convinced that she took it and probably felt bad about it.
Claiming your med is "As harmless as a sugar cookie" is a huge red flag right there.