July 15, 1962 (Sunday)

• The Washington Post broke the story of thalidomide tablets that had been distributed in the United States, in a story by Morton Mintz under the headline "Heroine of FDA Keeps Bad Drug Off Market". As a result of the publicity, more than 2.5 million thalidomide pills, which had been distributed to physicians by the Richardson-Merrell pharmaceutical company pending approval by the U.S. Food and Drug Administration, were recalled. Although thousands of babies were born with defects in Europe, the FDA identified only 17 known cases in the United States.

OCTOBER 3, 2024 | 21 MIN READ

Where Did All the Thalidomide Pills Distributed in the U.S. Go?

FDA medical examiner Frances Oldham Kelsey saved American lives by refusing to approve thalidomide. But millions of pills had been sent to doctors in the U.S. for so-called clinical trials

BY KATIE HAFNER, ELAH FEDER, DEBORAH UNGER & THE LOST WOMEN OF SCIENCE INITIATIVE EDITED BY JEFFERY DELVISCIO


Lisk Feng

Health

It’s the summer of 1962, and the drug thalidomide has been off the market in Europe for months after it was determined to be unsafe to use during pregnancy. But in the U.S., people are only just beginning to find out about the scandal. The Washington Post breaks the story and puts a picture of Food and Drug Administration medical examiner Frances Oldham Kelsey, who refused to approve the medication, on the front page. She’s the hero who saved American lives.

President John F. Kennedy gives her a medal, and her image is splashed across newspapers around the country. Meanwhile, at the end of the previous year, Richardson-Merrell, the company that wanted to sell thalidomide in the U.S., had made a half-hearted attempt to contact some of the doctors who had been given millions of thalidomide samples for so-called clinical trials. Just how many pregnant people might have thalidomide in their medicine cabinet?

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TRANSCRIPT

President John F. Kennedy: Recent events in this country and abroad concerning the effects of a new sedative called thalidomide emphasize again the urgency of providing additional protection to American consumers from harmful or worthless drug products…

Katie Hafner: In July, 1962, an editor at “The Washington Post” called a reporter named Morton Mintz over to his desk. The Post had gotten a tip. About an astonishing story.

There was a drug called thalidomide that was suspected of injuring thousands of babies in Europe. And the drug had been withdrawn from the market in Germany and the U.K. eight months earlier. But somehow, by the summer of 1962, most Americans still knew nothing about this. And thousands of them were taking the drug, completely unaware of its dangers to pregnant women — that is, until July 15, the day The Washington Post put Morton Mintz’s story on the front page. The headline: “Heroine’ of FDA Keeps Bad Drug off Market.” And there, right above the fold, was a photograph of that very heroine: Frances Oldham Kelsey.

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