A thalidomide baby born with deformities in the arms (Judith Johnson, 2019) 

Do you know anyone who is pregnant or planning to be? Then you have surely heard or seen a glimpse of the preparation and panicking that goes into the experience for the expectant mother. Expectant mothers, whether they are pregnant or planning for pregnancy, must endure so much from the moment they know that a baby is in the picture. To ease a slim portion of the pain and uneasiness that comes with pregnancy, many mothers have previously taken the drug Thalidomide before it became prohibited for pregnant women to consume.  Thalidomide was taken to help relieve symptoms of morning sickness among mothers in the early pregnancy stages. Little did these mothers know they were hurting their own babies in their wombs where the babies were supposed to have a safe place to develop and grow. However, the mothers were not at fault because they were prescribed the drug during a time when birth defects were not a known symptom of thalidomide. Many mothers across the world took thalidomide to help relieve their morning sickness but the drug was malforming their babies’ limbs and causing an ample amount of expectant healthy babies to come out with birth deformities. The birth deformities for thalidomide babies included the babies having short arms and legs, missing arms and legs, missing parts of the ear, and deafness. Thus started the cautionary tale of thalidomide: the baby deformer.  

Thalidomide 

Thalidomide is a sedative drug prescribed to pregnant mothers before the 1960s to treat morning sickness during the early pregnancy stage. Morning sickness is a symptom experienced by many mothers early on in their pregnancy during which they feel nauseous and vomit. In the 1950s, the West German pharmaceutical company Chemie Grünenthal GmbH created thalidomide, which was used to relieve symptoms in pregnant women, primarily nausea (Thalidomide | Science Museum, 2019).

Displays the correlation between thalidomide and its deformities that resulted at the same rate shortly after the sales (Ohnishi and Hinoshita, 2017) 

In 1961, Dr. William McBride, an Australian doctor, and Dr. Widukind Lenz, a German doctor, made the first public announcement about the link between birth development and thalidomide (Rehman et al., 2011).  Shortly after the discovery linking child malformation to thalidomide, the drug was withdrawn for use everywhere. Dr. Frances Oldham Kelsey worked for the Food and Drug Administration (FDA) where she took a firm stance on not allowing thalidomide to be approved and released to the United States until it was thoroughly tested despite any political pressure she faced (Changing the Face of Medicine | Frances Kathleen Oldham Kelsey, 2015). Due to her strong position on the drug, thalidomide was not sold in the US, preventing the mass tragedy faced by many others. Despite thalidomide not being sold in the US, there were 17 babies born from mothers that have taken that drug, 9 of whom obtained samples from American drug companies while the remaining mothers obtained the drug outside the country (US Thalidomide Survivors | US Thalidomide Survivors, 2019). 

Dr. Frances Oldham Kelsey received an award from President John F. Kennedy for the prevention of birth deformities in the US (McFadden, 2015) 

The Cells That Helped Unveil Thalidomide’s Effects 

HeLa cells were cells obtained from Henrietta Lacks, a black woman who died from cervical cancer, by a Johns Hopkins researcher who set forth the domino effect of distributing and using the cells to help further medicine. Due to the immortality of the cells, they were in high demand by all scientists around the world and spread quickly with the advancement of science. However, the method by which the cells were first obtained came at a cost, the cost of privacy, consent, and much more. The researcher first obtained the cells when the cells were sent to the lab, where the cells’ ability to multiply and remain alive in the lab was discovered. This discovery led to unethical judgments made by the researcher to take the HeLa cells of the deceased Henrietta Lacks despite the lack of consent from Henrietta’s family. HeLa cells were mass-produced and distributed without the family’s knowledge, and they were unaware of this till recently. The unfairness did not end after the accumulation of the HeLa cells, rather it set forth the events of Henrietta’s family being manipulated for scientific gains over the course of many years without any compensation or recognition for the family’s contributions. Events such as this led to irreparable actions that resulted in the distrust of doctors and researchers, especially among communities of color. Primarily the black community was now more hesitant about medical personnel due to the doubts that arose from the HeLa cells scandal. After hearing such a horror story and knowing it is one of the many occurrences of people being mistreated for their skin color, it is understandable when people of color express and act upon their doubts and fears of the medical field.  

The tragedy of Henrietta Lacks will never be forgotten for it lives on today to help prevent future tragedies such as that of thalidomide. HeLa cells were used to portray the birth defects that were caused by thalidomide, preventing the drug from entering the US market, and ultimately preventing a mass baby tragedy (National Institutes of Health, 2022). Without access to HeLa cells, it would not have been possible to prevent such a disaster from unraveling. HeLa cells have led to a distrust in doctors, and this may cause many to believe that thalidomide could have possibly been distributed with the intention of harming babies. Although the doubts and skepticism towards thalidomide cannot be proven, this drug too led to a distrust in doctors and researchers for allowing a “quick fix” to be used that ultimately had severe consequences in the long run. Medicine and science are continuously evolving but the means in which it evolves should also include morals and ethics as the bare minimum. HeLa cells made many contributions to science, but a major accomplishment is the aid it provided in preventing the spread of thalidomide in the US.  

Thalidomide, once a favored drug for morning sickness, is now a drug to be cautious of due to its cause of baby deformities. It was administered to pregnant women outside the US which resulted in child malformations and eventually led to the withdrawal of the drug. Due to Dr. Kelsey, thalidomide was not distributed in the US and a mass tragedy was prevented. HeLa cells provided the foundation that revealed the effects of development on children from thalidomide, further protecting the tragedy from continuing. Although the drug is not administered anymore, except on rare occasions, thalidomide has unveiled many aspects of both the medical and ethical side of science that we take into consideration to this day.  

Works Cited 

“Changing the Face of Medicine | Frances Kathleen Oldham Kelsey.” Nih.gov, 2015, cfmedicine.nlm.nih.gov/physicians/biography_182.html#:~:text=Changing%20the%20Face%20of%20Medicine%20%7C%20Frances%20Kathleen%20Oldham%20Kelsey&text=In%201960%2C%20during%20her%20first. Accessed 20 Sept. 2023. 

Judith Johnson. “Thalidomide: Nine Things You Didn’t Know about the “Poisonous Pill” •.” Judith Johnson PhD, 12 Apr. 2019, judithjohnsonphd.com/2019/04/12/thalidomide-nine-things-you-didnt-know-about-the-poisonous-pill/. 

McFadden, Robert D. “Frances Oldham Kelsey, Who Saved U.S. Babies from Thalidomide, Dies at 101.” The New York Times, 7 Aug. 2015, www.nytimes.com/2015/08/08/science/frances-oldham-kelsey-fda-doctor-who-exposed-danger-of-thalidomide-dies-at-101.html. 

National Institutes of Health. “Significant Research Advances Enabled by HeLa Cells – Office of Science Policy.” Office of Science Policy, 3 Oct. 2022, osp.od.nih.gov/hela-cells/significant-research-advances-enabled-by-hela-cells/. 

Ohnishi, Shin, and Fumihiko Hinoshita. Guide for the Management of Thalidomide Embryopathy 2017 Edited By. 2017. 

Rehman, Waqas, et al. “The Rise, Fall and Subsequent Triumph of Thalidomide: Lessons Learned in Drug Development.” Therapeutic Advances in Hematology, vol. 2, no. 5, 4 Aug. 2011, pp. 291–308, www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pmc/articles/PMC3573415/, https://doi.org/10.1177/2040620711413165. Accessed 5 Oct. 2019. 

“Thalidomide | Science Museum.” Www.sciencemuseum.org.uk, 11 Dec. 2019, www.sciencemuseum.org.uk/objects-and-stories/medicine/thalidomide#:~:text=Thalidomide%20is%20a%20compound%20that. 

“US Thalidomide Survivors | US Thalidomide Survivors.” US Thalidomide Survivors , 21 Nov. 2019, usthalidomide.org/#:~:text=The%20official%20FDA%20count%20released. Accessed 20 Sept. 2023.