Personal Injury Solicitors

The government has agreed to an independent expert review looking into the cases of women given a pregnancy-testing drug which may have caused foetal deformities and stillbirths.

The Liverpool Echo reports that dozens of women living on Merseyside could have suffered miscarriages, stillbirths and given birth to children with disabilities as a result of taking the drug Primodos, which was used as a hormonal pregnancy-testing drug from the 1960s to 1970s.

Primodos was made by the drug company Schering – now Bayer.

Drug safety watchdog The Medicines and Healthcare Products Regulatory Agency (MHRA) says that available data is insufficient to prove a causal link between Primodos and birth defects.

MP Louise Ellman has tabled a parliamentary question to Health Minister George Freeman about the progress of an independent review into Primodos, however.

Mr Freeman said that a panel of independent experts will review all available data on Primodos – and the government is currently collating all available documents with a view to the panel beginning to scrutinise them in early 2015.

Ms Ellman – who is MP for Riverside in Liverpool – said that there was “widespread concern” about the use of Primodos.

“We now need to get to the bottom of what’s happened,” she added.

Support group The Association for Children Damaged by Hormone Pregnancy Tests has been campaigning about the use of Primodos since 1978 – and has already taken Schering to court to try and prove the Primodos caused birth defects, stillbirths and miscarriages.

The group disbanded when it ran out of money after no evidence linking Primodos with birth defects was uncovered. It reformed in 2009 after new evidence was found. The association is now hopeful that the independent review will establish a link between the drug and foetal defects.

However, Bayer has issued a statement saying the company “strongly denies” any link between Primodos and foetal damage.

The association says that there are at least 52 women living on Merseyside alone who took the drug as a pregnancy test – and whose pregnancy resulted in stillbirth, miscarriage or birth defects.

Chair of the association Marie Lyon believes many more women who took Primodos may be affected without realising it.

Ms Lyon’s daughter, Sarah, 44, was born with one arm shorter than the other after her mother took the drug. Ms Lyon said she was handed a packet containing two tablets to take and told if she did not bleed after taking them, she was pregnant.

However, when her daughter was born, her arm below the elbow was not properly developed.

“…at the end of where her elbow should have been, there was a tiny pad with five little fingers on.

“Doctors didn’t know why, said Ms Lyon. “No one ever asked if I had taken anything. I only found out when she was eight there could be a connection and I was horrified because I was exceptionally lucky.

“I had a son four-and-a-half years later and I changed doctors, otherwise I would have taken that tablet again. I would never have linked the two.”

The drugs used in the hormonal pregnancy test were norethisterone acetate (10mg) and ethinylestradiol (0.02mg).

The Liverpool Echo reports that in the late 1960s, several studies found an association between HPTs during pregnancy and congenital abnormalities, although other studies found no such association.

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