Open this publication in new window or tab >>2025 (English)In: Histories of Fetal Knowledge Production in Sweden:: Medicine, Politics, and Public Controversy, 1530-2020 / [ed] Solveig Jülich, Leiden: Brill Academic Publishers, 2025, 1, p. 286-305Chapter in book (Refereed)
Abstract [en]
This chapter addresses the Swedish management of the thalidomide scandal in the 1960s. It provides a brief overview of the scandal and its various consequences, such as changes in pharmaceutical regulation and amendments to abortion legislation, as well as surveillance operations organized by the National Board of Medicine in order to find all affected individuals. It also discusses aspects of the ambitious rehabilitation program, launched in 1962, which aimed at assessing the impairments of each child and providing suitable help, often in the form of prosthetic limbs. The leading principle of the program—normalization—is analyzed through a lens of biopolitics. The push for normalization had dual consequences. One was that the children were mainly cared for in family homes, instead of being institutionalized. The other was that the urge for normality also affected how the children’s physical bodies were perceived and adjusted to resemble more ‘able’ bodies.
Place, publisher, year, edition, pages
Leiden: Brill Academic Publishers, 2025 Edition: 1
Series
Clio Medica Online, ISSN 1875-6689 ; 107
National Category
Social Work
Identifiers
urn:nbn:se:liu:diva-216985 (URN)10.1163/9789004703759_012 (DOI)2-s2.0-85206285015 (Scopus ID)9789004703759 (ISBN)
Funder
Swedish Research Council, 2014-1749
Note
The chapter was written within the research project Medicine at the Borders of Life: Fetal Research and theEmergence of Ethical Controversy in Sweden (2015–2021). PI Professor Solveig Jülich, Uppsala University
2025-08-272025-08-272026-01-08Bibliographically approved