D'Amato 33 specialised in the study of blood vessels and was particularly concerned with how

D'Amato, 33, specialised in the study of blood vessels, and was particularly concerned with how their growth affected eye diseases like diabetic retinopathy (the most frequent cause of blindness in people aged between 20 and 60) and senile macular degeneration (the leading cause of blindness in those over 65). Between the 20th and 25th days of development, there would be defects of the ears and eyes; between 26 and 30 days, there would be defects of the arms; between 31 and 35 days, there would be defects of the legs. If a woman took it during the first trimester of her pregnancy, certain things would happen to the growth of her foetus. With so many varied diseases to treat, thalidomide could now be used by so many more people than had used it in the Fifties and Sixties.

The potential side-effects - so many babies born dead, or with missing or deformed limbs, or with damaged internal organs - remained the same, too.Alongside aspirin, thalidomide can lay claim to being the most famous man-made drug of all time, but only because of the suffering it caused. Perhaps now it was a little purer than it used to be, and came in soluble capsules rather than tablets It was called things like Sauramide and Synovir. Some medical researchers were talking of it as a panacea, almost a miracle.The ingredients of the drug remained the same as they had always been. And, throughout the world, it was being tried for cancer, tuberculosis and rheumatoid arthritis.

This time it was not being sold as a sedative, but for a large number of uses for which it was never intended In Brazil and Israel it helped those with leprosy. In the United States it prevented a major cause of blindness. In the UK it was being used for two severe symptoms of HIV and Aids. Throughout Europe it was found successful in graft-versus-host disease, a common complication of bone marrow transplants. In Germany it was being made by the same company that had patented it almost 40 years ago.

Thalidomide was making a comeback, and not in a shy way.They had learned that the drug now had up to 50 different trade names, and was being manufactured in the United States, Canada, Brazil and Wales. As they talked in the bar, there was a new topic of conversation, one that had rarely occupied them before, and one which they believed they would never ever have to confront. Unlike other barbiturates, thalidomide was considered so safe that even pregnant women could take it. So they did, many thousands of them, and a small fraction of their 10,000 offspring was now in a large hotel in Sweden discussing all the things that concerned them most: compensation, ageing, pain relief, mobility.This was only the second time such an international gathering had been organised - the first was four years ago - and people had come from Japan, Scotland, Germany, Canada and the Netherlands to attend. Great claims were made for the drug, not least that it was completely non-toxic.

They came from all over the world, but they had a similar taste in clothes, food, and beer. They shared one more thing: their mothers had all taken thalidomide between 1957 and 1962, primarily as a sedative, a sleeping pill, something that could calm nerves and help with morning sickness. All in their mid-30s, most of them seemed to like the same sort of music and sport. The dangers, of course, still remain, and they, too, have made themselves felt A report by Simon Garfield. Photographs by Chris Steele-Perkins Towards the end of last month, 115 people with no arms or legs gathered in a small village in southern Sweden to talk about their common interests. It has re-emerged as one of the wonder drugs of the Nineties: doctors and scientists are convinced of its benefits, and from Britain to Brazil are using it to treat conditions ranging from blindness to HIV to leprosy. This is a picture you probably thought you would never see - thalidomide being made in Britain in 1995; thalidomide, the drug that produced deformed babies. The way they raised themselves this afternoon was fantastic.".