Health committee  Yes, of course. The thing is, there are a number of genetic syndromes that we get to find out more and more about, where the syndrome is really very close to thalidomide, with the limb reduction that's so typical of thalidomide, but there are differences, and certainly a genetic cause has been found in several of them.

Health committee  You're absolutely right, and this is a particularly difficult thing because of the rarity of the condition and the fact that it happened so long ago when there was very little understood about any of these things. I've often thought that it's sad that the scheme was ever introduced, in the sense that it's picking out one cause of serious birth defects when of course anyone who has a birth defect needs special assistance and they don't get it.

Health committee  In our research subsequent to the meeting, where we tried to devise a diagnostic algorithm to help us, we certainly conclude that genetic screening is a very important tool.

Health committee  I think so, yes. That's exactly what we did. It's our main finding, the genetic screening and of course the family history, which obviously is linked with the genetics. Yes, I think it's important.

Health committee  It won't really deal with the unrecognized group. As I said, the hard evidence tells us that the extreme limb reduction, the deformities, and the deafness stand out as things known to be caused by the drug. The rest is speculative. We have other possible causes—as I said, the genetic causes in particular and the other embryopathic drugs that we ought to take into account.

Health committee  Yes. I convened it and chaired it.

Health committee  Yes. They, of course, are the well-known ones: limb reductions, hearing problems, some cardiac problems, small jaw, and all of these things. The problem we all have is that it's a catch-22. Those things that were recognized by the experts were the things that stood out. Other things that were included didn't happen very often and didn't happen with all of the victims, so we're left with a group of conditions that could easily be caused by something else, something more common than the exposure to thalidomide.

Health committee  Thank you very much. Thank you for asking me to be part of this important meeting. My main interest started when I was about to become a medical student and heard, of course, of the Distillers action in the U.K. when the story of the thalidomide problem first broke. Thalidomide was in fact the start of the discipline that I've worked in since 1980, namely pharmacovigilance.