Ottawa offers $125k to thalidomide survivors

The federal government is offering each of Canada’s 95 surviving thalidomide victims a $125,000 lump-sum payment and access to a medical assistance fund of up to $168 million.

“It is the right thing to do,” Health Minister Rona Ambrose said Friday in Edmonton, adding the government knows it has “a clear moral obligation to support the survivors of this tragedy.”

Thalidomide survivor Alvin Law of Calgary, who was born without arms after his mother took the drug during pregnancy, welcomed the news.

“Honestly, I am feeling incredible gratitude,” said Law, 54, who has a career as a motivational speaker.

He called the $125,000 payment “a significant gesture” but said it won’t be enough for many, especially those survivors who have never worked, don’t have pensions or other retirement funds, and have accumulated high levels of debt.

Law said he and others would have been better served with a $250,000 payment, pensions of $7,500 per month, and the ability to manage the money themselves.

Thalidomide caused miscarriages, stillbirths and babies born with shortened or missing limbs, missing or extra fingers and toes, deafness, blindness and damage to internal organs.

It had been approved in Canada in April 1961 as a prescription drug to treat morning sickness and insomnia in pregnant women. Some doctors had made it available as a sample tablet since late 1959.

The drug remained legally available in Canada until March 1962, three months after it had been banned in England and Germany. Some Canadian pharmacies had it available until May 1962.

Survivors, now in their mid-50s, are facing new health problems as they age.

Ambrose expressed the government’s sympathy and regret “for the decades of tremendous suffering and personal struggle that exposure to thalidomide has inflicted on survivors and their loved ones.”

But no amount of regret, sympathy or compensation “can ever undo what happened,” she said.

The tax-free $125,000 payment to cover urgent health needs will be delivered within weeks.

Up to $168 million will help with ongoing health needs. That funding will be delivered by a third party, based on individual needs.

The package also includes funding to cover “extraordinary” health costs such as surgery not available in Canada.

EDMONTON JOURNAL/ FILES Alvin Law speaks to a young audience at a Students Against Drinking and Driving Conference. Law is one of the 95 surviving thalidomide babies who will receive $125,000 in a lump sum payment from Ottawa as part of a compensation plan. The plan also...