The Australian Government is to issue a formal apology to people affected by thalidomide, the morning sickness drug that caused significant birth defects in babies during the 1950s and 1960s, and which left an indelible mark on thousands of children born worldwide.
It would also unveil a national memorial site, said Prime Minister Anthony Albanese, describing the “thalidomide tragedy” as a “dark chapter” in history for Australia and the world and saying the apology was well overdue.
“In giving this apology, we will acknowledge all of those babies who died and the families who mourn them, as well as those who survived but whose lives were made so much harder by the effects of this terrible drug,” Albanese said on Monday.
Thalidomide was marketed as a sedative and anti-nausea drug for pregnant women in the 1950s, but caused birth defects including “shortened or absent limbs, blindness, deafness or malformed internal organs”, according to Australia’s Department of Health.
The drug was not tested on pregnant women before being approved, and the birth defect crisis led to greater medical oversight worldwide, including the creation of Australia’s Therapeutic Goods Administration, reports The Guardian.
Worldwide, more than 10 000 children are estimated to have been born with birth defects because of thalidomide use, with an estimated 40% of these children dying within a year.
Thalidomide survivors continue to live with the impacts of the drug today.
At the time, Australia did not have a system for evaluating the safety of medicines before they were put on the market. Although it was ultimately removed from the market, this was only after many pregnant women in Australia had already taken the drug.
Albanese will deliver the formal national apology to all Australians affected by the thalidomide tragedy on 29 November in Parliament House, with the national site of recognition being unveiled the next day, near Canberra’s Lake Burley Griffin.
Australian thalidomide survivors have welcomed the apology, which they also said was overdue.
They have long called on successive federal governments to better support their health needs through more funding and services.
The government said 146 thalidomide survivors are registered with the federal Thalidomide Survivors Support Programme, but it admitted the exact number of people affected by the drug is unknown.
Despite the Department of Health being told of the dangers of thalidomide in late 1961, governments around Australia did not immediately act to destroy supplies or ban the drug’s use, and unlike other countries, no efforts were made to immediately recall and destroy the product that was in doctors’ clinics or pharmacies.
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