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German Drug Maker Apologizes to Victims of Thalidomide German Drug Maker Apologizes to Victims of Thalidomide
(about 2 hours later)
BERLIN (AP) — The German manufacturer of thalidomide, a drug that caused thousands of babies to be born with shortened arms and legs, or no limbs at all, has issued its first apology — 50 years after taking the drug off the market. LONDON — Decades of campaigning by victims of thalidomide, a morning sickness drug, have taken a new turn, with the first apology in 50 years to the victims and their families by the drug’s German manufacturer — and an incensed rejection of the apology as too little and too late from many of those it was intended to placate.
The manufacturer, the Grünenthal Group, said on Friday that it wanted to apologize to mothers who took the drug during the 1950s and ’60s and to their children who had congenital birth defects as a result. The apology was issued on Friday by Harald Stock, chief executive of the Grünenthal Group, a family-owned pharmaceutical company that marketed the drug in the 1950s and early 1960s. It was withdrawn in 1961 after it was linked to birth defects, including shortened arms and legs, and in some cases no limbs at all, that campaigners say affected 10,000 babies around the world, mostly in Australia, Canada, Europe and Japan.
“We ask for forgiveness that for nearly 50 years we didn’t find a way of reaching out to you from human being to human being,” said the company’s chief executive, Harald F. Stock. “We ask that you regard our long silence as a sign of the silent shock that your fate has caused in us.” The apology came in a speech Mr. Stock delivered in the Rhineland town of Stolberg, the company’s base, at the unveiling of a thalidomide memorial, a bronze statue of a limbless child.
Mr. Stock spoke in Stolberg, the city in which the company is based, during the unveiling of a bronze statue symbolizing a child born without limbs because of thalidomide. Addressing the victims and their families, particularly their mothers, he said the company wished to “apologize for the fact that we have not found the way to you from person to person for almost 50 years.”
The statue is called “The Sick Child” — a name that a German victims’ group objects to because all the victims are now adults. In German, the name also implies “cure.” “Instead, we have been silent, and we are very sorry for that.”
Thalidomide, a powerful sedative, was sold under the name Contergan in Germany. It was given to pregnant women, mostly to combat morning sickness, and led to a wave of birth defects in Australia, Canada, Europe and Japan. It was also found to cause defects of the eyes, ears, heart, genitals and internal organs of developing babies, and was pulled from the market in 1961. According to an English translation of his remarks that appeared on Grünenthal’s Web site, he added, “We ask that you regard our long silence as a sign of the shock that your fate caused in us.” As for the company’s delay in moving beyond its previous expressions of regret for marketing the drug to a direct apology to the victims, he said that in recent discussions with victims and their families, “we learned how much it is publicly desired that we express our deep regrets to those affected by thalidomide.”
Thalidomide was never approved for use in pregnant women in the United States. Although thalidomide, a powerful sedative, was never approved for use by pregnant women in the United States, some victims are American.
Freddie Astbury, 52, of Liverpool, England, was born without arms or legs after his mother took thalidomide. He said the apology was years overdue. One is Berrisford Boothe, 51, an associate professor of art at Lehigh University in Bethlehem, Pa., who described himself in a telephone interview as one of 26 known American thalidomide victims. He said he had been born in Jamaica with severe disabilities in both hands and arms, and had had a “long and isolated journey” as a child growing up in Jamaica and later the United States.
“It’s a disgrace that it’s taken them 50 years to apologize,” said Mr. Astbury, the president of the Thalidomide U.K. Agency, an advocacy group for survivors. “I’m gobsmacked. For years, they have insisted they never did anything wrong and refused to talk to us.”  In Jamaica, he said, “African belief systems were very much in effect. So when my mother had me, it was seen that it was because she had done something wrong in life, and that is how she was judged — openly. So was my father. It ruined their marriage, and it shaped my life.”
Mr. Astbury said the drug maker should offer compensation, pointing out that expenses for victims run into the millions of dollars. “It’s time to put their money where their mouth is,” he said. Mr. Stock said the company had carried out all the tests on thalidomide before it was marketed that were possible given the scientific knowledge available in the 1950s.
Mr. Astbury said that he and other British thalidomide victims had received some money over the years from a trust set up by the drug’s British distributor, but that Grünenthal had never agreed to settle any British case. But the storm of protest the apology provoked from thalidomide victims and groups that represent them suggested that the apology had done little to assuage the anger and hurt accumulated over decades of campaigning for a full acknowledgment of thalidomide’s harm, as well as for commitments to more generous levels of compensation.
In the 1970s, Grünenthal settled a lawsuit in Germany, created a $188.7 million fund for 3,000 German victims, and expressed its regret. But for decades, the company has refused to admit liability, saying it had conducted all necessary clinical trials required at the time. “It is over 50 years on since the thalidomide tragedy — why now?” said Freddie Astbury, chief consultant at Thalidomide U.K. Agency, which represents people affected by the drug in Britain, where nearly 500 victims survive. He said British victims had received some compensation from the government and from distributors of thalidomide, but not enough.
Mr. Stock reiterated that position on Friday, saying, “The suffering that occurred with Contergan 50 years ago happened in a world that is completely different from today.” Mr. Astbury, 53, who was born with no arms and no legs, said he believed that one reason for Mr. Stock’s speech was greater global awareness of issues affecting the disabled, manifested by the success of the Paralympic Games, currently drawing sellout crowds in London.
A German victims’ group, the Association of Contergan Victims, rejected the company’s apology as too little, too late. He pointed, too, to a pending class-action lawsuit in Australia that legal experts have said could result in new compensation awards for thalidomide victims running into tens of millions of dollars.
“The apology as such doesn’t help us deal with our everyday life,” said Ilonka Stebritz, a spokeswoman for the group. “What we need are other things.” “We are glad the apology has been made,” Mr. Astbury said. “But when you are disabled, it costs a lot of money. We are in our 50s, we need care. We need adaptations in our houses and cars, for starters. So if they’re serious, let’s get around the table and talk financial help.”
In July, an Australian woman born without arms and legs after her mother took thalidomide reached a multimillion-dollar settlement with the drug’s British distributor. Again, Grünenthal refused to settle. The lawsuit was part of a class action.

Sandy Macaskill contributed reporting.

On Saturday, lawyers for the woman, Lynette Rowe, said Grünenthal’s apology rang hollow.
“To suggest that its long silence before today ought to be put down to ‘silent shock’ on its part is insulting nonsense,” they said in a statement. “For 50 years, Grünenthal has been engaged in a calculated corporate strategy to avoid the moral, legal and financial consequences of its reckless and negligent actions of the 1950s and 1960s.”
Thalidomide is still sold today, but as a treatment for multiple myeloma, a bone marrow cancer and leprosy.