New Use for Disastrous Drug Thalidomide?

According to lab experiments reported on Sunday, Thalidomide, the sedative blamed for tragic birth defects half a century ago, treated a rare inherited blood disorder.

Around one person in 10,000 has a disorder called hereditary haemorrhagic telangiectasia, or HHT, which causes frequent, hard-to-treat nosebleeds.

Thalidomide Mystery Solved by Japanese Scientists
According to a study released Friday, Japanese scientists have uncovered how thalidomide led to deformities in children born to mothers taking the drug in the 1950s and 1960s.

French doctors, experimenting on mice genetically engineered to have HHT, found that Thalidomide reduced the risk of haemorrhage and stabilised blood vessels.

The drug works by boosting a protein called PDGF-B, the team from the National Institute of Health and Medical Research (Inserm) report in the journal Nature Medicine.

The work is experimental, aimed at showing the pathways by which HHT could be cured.

UK Govt To Pay Thalidomide Victims ?20 Million
The British government has announced £20 million would be disbursed to thalidomide victims over the next three years. It will also issue a public apology to the so-called 'thalidomiders.'

Thalidomide was sold between 1957 and 1961 until it was found that pregnant women who took the drug for morning sickness were at high risk of having a child missing a limb or having stunted arms.

More than 10,000 babies, especially in Germany, Britain, Australia and Canada, were affected.

Thalidomide is the new approved drug for treating multiple cancers
Therapeutic Goods Administration (TGA) had approved the drug for use to treat the cancer multiple myeloma in 2003.

The scandal led to a tightening of vetting procedures for drug prototypes and scrutiny of claims by pharmaceutical giants.

Thalidomide remains outlawed for general distribution.

Banned Drug Thalidomide Shows Promise for Recurrent Ovarian Treatment
Thalidomide, a drug banned in the 1950s for causing birth defects, is showing promise as a safe and effective treatment for women with recurrent ovarian cancer.

In recent years, though, interest in it has revived as a research tool but also as a treatment for a form of cancer called multiple myeloma and side-effects from leprosy. It is prescribed to patients only in very tightly-controlled conditions.

Source-AFP
TRI