British government apologises to thalidomide victims

THE British government issued a long-awaited apology yesterday to victims of a half-century-old thalidomide drug scandal, and confirmed a £20 million (€22.5m) funding package to help them.

A total of 466 survivors of the drug – which caused children to be born with physical deformities after their mothers took thalidomide for morning sickness during pregnancy – are eligible for support.

“I know many thalidomiders have waited a long time for this,” health minister Mike O’Brien told the House of Commons, using the term for victims of the drug at the end of the 1950s. “The government wishes to express its sincere regret and deep sympathy for the injury and suffering endured by all those affected when expectant mothers took the drug thalidomide between 1958 and 1961,” he said.