Thalidomide victims 'failed' by NHS

An MP made an emotional plea yesterday for the government to take immediate action on the dire health care situation faced by the 463 remaining Thalidomide victims. Skip related content

"Thalidomiders are a group of people who have been disabled by the National Health Service; the Department of Health is implicated in the whole tragedy," Charlotte Atkins (Lab, Staffordshire Moorlands) said in her opening remarks.

"Thalidomiders have on average six chronic problems such as epilepsy. They have complex health care needs which are constantly evolving and are unpredictable."

Due to a "failure by the NHS to provide relevant and adequate health care for Thalidomiders ... the Thalidomide Trust has established an independent health support service which includes its own mechanism to reclassify an individuals degree of disability," she said.

However, Atkins cautioned: "The trust has the ability to carry out only ten to twenty reviews per year."

Tony Baldry (Con, Banbury) said:

"A perfectly acceptable use for the Department of Healths budget would be to make a sufficient ex-gratia year-on-year payment to the Trust."

The Department of Health has offered Thalidomiders the chance to participate in a pilot scheme to examine the roll out of a personal health budget.

Several MPs in the debate, including George Howarth (Lab, Knowsley North) shared the vision that "sufficient experience is held by the Trust," and therefore a pilot programme would be lengthy and unnecessary.

Shadow Health Minister Mike Penning said that if the Conservatives form a government, "we will announce immediately an independent review of all the medical needs of Thalidomiders which will report within three months".

Atkins said the Thalidomide Trust has been independently reviewing the issues for 40 years.

Health Services Minister Mike O'Brien said:

"I accept there are increased health and care needs required by Thalidomiders.

"We need to examine what these needs are, and how they should be addressed.

"We need to see if we can use current legislation on social care, plus legislation going through the House now on health care, and to identify about twenty people (but this is not a maximum) who would be assessed for their needs and to put in place funding through the Thalidomide Trust to ensure individual needs are met."

He said that would be put in place "by the early months of next year".