Baroness Cumberlege, Cat Smith and Rachael Maskell are among the MPs who have signed an open letter to Secretary of State for Health and Social Care Wes Streeting asking for compensation for anyone affected by the valproate scandal.
Baroness Bennet of Manor Castle and Baroness Brinton have also signed the letter and supported the ask.
In the letter, sent in July, Epilepsy Action said that “thousands of lives have been ruined” due to the scandal. It added that “this has placed a huge financial burden on many families”.
Valproate is an effective epilepsy medicine, but it can increase the risk of learning and physical problems in babies if taken during pregnancy.
Health professionals were aware of these risks since the early 1970s, but many doctors didn’t communicate them to women being prescribed the medicine.
As a result, an estimated 20,000 children and their families have been affected. Some of the children require 24-hour care.
“Need to see justice served”
Two separate reports into the scandal, the Cumberlege report (2020) and the Hughes report (2024), have called for the government to put in place a redress scheme. This is needed to “address the grievances of those who have been harmed by health system failings”, the organisation wrote.
The government has paid compensation to people affected by similar scandals, including £80 million in 2012 to those affected by Thalidomide. This medicine was prescribed to expecting mothers to control morning sickness symptoms, but caused physical disabilities in many of their babies.
More recently, around 140 women who had traumatic complications resulting from vaginal mesh implants have reached a settlement with the manufacturers Johnson & Johnson, Bard and Boston Scientific.
However, Henrietta Hughes, patient safety commissioner, said this is only a “tiny faction of the women estimated to have been harmed by this intervention”. She stressed that patients shouldn’t have to go through a lengthy legal process to “obtain redress for harm caused by the healthcare system”.
Daniel Jennings, senior policy and campaigns officer at Epilepsy Action, said: “While we welcome the news about the settlement for those affected by the vaginal mesh scandal, we still need to see justice served for the hundreds of families affected by valproate.
“They shouldn’t have to go through a lengthy and stressful legal process to obtain redress for the major financial and emotional toll this has had on their lives.
“We also want to see a swift resolution to some of the outstanding recommendations in the Cumberlege report, including the implementation of specialist centres to provide care and advice for those adversely affected by medications taken in pregnancy.”
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