Thalidomide survivors look back at 10 years of a more dignified life

(function(){ document.write(''); var parentEl = document.getElementById("giScriptEl").parentNode; parentEl.removeChild(document.querySelector('#giScriptEl')); // *** start add your photos and text *** var mediaCardObj = { "element": parentEl, "media": [ { "video_url": "https://www.theglobeandmail.com/files/editorial/News/lf-lc-h-thalidomide-survivors/seq1", "photo_url": "", "landscape_contain": "true", "portrait_contain": "true", "credit": "", "textbox": [ { "title": "", "position": "centre", "text": [ ["Mercedes Benegbi hosted brunch for four friends and her 98-year-old mother on a Tuesday afternoon earlier this month. As she does every year on the second of the December, she lifted her wine glass and made a toast. “À la victoire,” she said. “256 to zero.”"], ["When she recites those numbers, she says, “my heart wants to explode.”"] ] } ] }, { "video_url": "", "photo_url": "https://www.theglobeandmail.com/files/editorial/News/lf-lc-h-thalidomide-survivors/seq2c", "landscape_contain": "true", "portrait_contain": "true", "credit": "Thalidomide victims at House of Commons, Dec. 2, 2014 (Dave Chan/The Globe and Mail)", "textbox": [ { "title": "", "position": "centre", "text": [ ["On that same date in 2014, members of the House of Commons stood one by one to unanimously support a compensation package for thalidomide survivors – a small group of then-middle-aged Canadians who as babies had borne the cost of one of the worst drug disasters in the country’s history."] ] } ] }, { "video_url": "", "photo_url": "https://www.theglobeandmail.com/files/editorial/News/lf-lc-h-thalidomide-survivors/seq4d", "landscape_contain": "false", "portrait_contain": "true", "credit": "Thalidomide victim Bernadette Bainbridge (Fred Lum/The Globe and Mail)", "textbox": [ { "title": "", "position": "centre", "text": [ ["For 50 years, the Canadian government had failed to take any real responsibility for approving thalidomide, despite a lack of evidence that it was safe for expecting mothers."], ["The drug, developed by Chemie Grünenthal, a German pharmaceutical company, was aggressively marketed in 46 countries as a treatment for pregnant women suffering from insomnia and morning sickness. In late 1959, months before it was even approved as a prescription, Canadian doctors received free samples to give to their patients."] ] } ] }, { "video_url": "", "photo_url": "https://www.theglobeandmail.com/files/editorial/News/lf-lc-h-thalidomide-survivors/seq6", "landscape_contain": "true", "portrait_contain": "true", "credit": "Kim Beeston, Canada’s first known thalidomide baby, with parents in 1962 (Harold Robinson/The Globe and Mail)", "textbox": [ { "title": "", "position": "left", "text": [ ["Thalidomide’s devastating consequences would only be realized much later: 10,000 babies around the world – including more than 100 in Canada – born with absent or stunted arms, missing legs and fingers, and deformed organs. The drug also caused an unknown number of miscarriages and stillbirths."] ] } ] }, { "video_url": "", "photo_url": "https://www.theglobeandmail.com/files/editorial/News/lf-lc-h-thalidomide-survivors/seq5", "landscape_contain": "true", "portrait_contain": "true", "credit": "Old thalidomide pillbox at the home of whistleblower Frances Kelsey, 2014 (Michelle Siu/The Globe and Mail)", "textbox": [ { "title": "", "position": "centre", "text": [ ["The drug was never approved for use in the United States; a steadfast medical reviewer decided the safety data was questionable. And when the emerging side effects were first publicly reported in early December, 1961, Britain, Australia and Germany immediately banned the drug."] ] } ] }, { "video_url": "", "photo_url": "https://www.theglobeandmail.com/files/editorial/News/lf-lc-h-thalidomide-survivors/seq7", "landscape_contain": "true", "portrait_contain": "true", "credit": "Mercedes Benegbi in 1973 (Hugh Winsor/The Globe and Mail)", "textbox": [ { "title": "", "position": "right", "text": [ ["Canada, however, delayed until March, 1962 – a negligence that forever changed Ms. Benegbi’s life. Her mother took thalidomide during those fateful extra months; Ms. Benegbi, now 63, was born without arms."] ] } ] }, { "video_url": "", "photo_url": "https://www.theglobeandmail.com/files/editorial/News/lf-lc-h-thalidomide-survivors/seq8", "landscape_contain": "true", "portrait_contain": "true", "credit": "Selena Phillips-Boyle/The Globe and Mail", "textbox": [ { "title": "", "position": "right", "text": [ ["She still chokes back tears recalling the long-awaited moment when the vote was officially recorded, and the boisterous cheers of the survivors watching from the public gallery."] ] } ] }, { "video_url": "", "photo_url": "https://www.theglobeandmail.com/files/editorial/News/lf-lc-h-thalidomide-survivors/seq9b", "landscape_contain": "true", "portrait_contain": "true", "credit": "Photo and opening video by Selena Phillips-Boyle/The Globe and Mail", "textbox": [ { "title": "", "position": "centre", "text": [ ["“It is unforgettable until I die,” says Ms. Benegbi, who was then the executive director of the Thalidomide Victims Association of Canada, and had worked for decades to make the case for compensation. “Finally, we had secured some dignity.”"] ] } ] } ], "credit": "", } // *** end add your photos and text *** if (typeof giapp == 'undefined') { giapp = {}; } giapp.mediacards = giapp.mediacards || {}; if (!giapp.mediacards.galleries) { giapp.mediacards.galleries = []; } giapp.mediacards.galleries.push(mediaCardObj); })();