Thalidomide was a drug prescribed in the 1950’s to pregnant women to treat nausea due to morning sickness. It worked well, however, the babies born to these mothers who took the drug were born with severe deformities. It caused babies to be born with abnormal or missing limbs, ears, or heart and digestive system defects. Eventually it was withdrawn, however, the damage was already done. It was one of the darkest episodes in pharmaceutical research history. The reasons for the deformities were only recently discovered, though many hypotheses were tested.
