• whyNotSquirrel@sh.itjust.worksEnglish
    272·
    4 days ago

    Thalidomide was first developed as a tranquilizer by Swiss pharmaceutical company Ciba in 1953. In 1954, Ciba abandoned the product, and it was acquired by German pharmaceutical company Chemie Grünenthal.[4] The company had been established by Hermann Wirtz Sr, a Nazi Party member, after World War II as a subsidiary of the family’s Mäurer & Wirtz company. The company’s initial aim was to develop antibiotics for which there was an urgent market need.

    https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Thalidomide_scandal

    I start to think that those Nazi people made bad thing happening on earth

    • protist@retrofed.comEnglish
      23·
      4 days ago

      The problem with this logic is that it extends to literally every business that existed in Germany during or immediately after WWII. The guy who exposed thalidomide as a teratogen and all but stopped its use worldwide had also been a Nazi. In reality, the pharmaceutical industry in all countries in the 40s and 50s had few to no guardrails and they caused a lot of inadvertent damage