Local view for "http://purl.org/linkedpolitics/eu/plenary/2016-03-09-Speech-3-668-000"
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"en.20160309.37.3-668-000"2
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"Madam President, many people think of the thalidomide issue as history – something that happened in the middle of the last century and was dealt with. Nothing of course could be further from the truth. The effects of thalidomide are not just historic: they are ongoing, they are in the present. Many thalidomide survivors and their families across Europe have suffered for over 50 years and are still suffering without adequate financial support; they cannot meet their everyday living costs and they certainly cannot meet their health costs. They do not want to live a life of luxury: they want enough to live in relative comfort, free from worry and chronic pain. Those who are still in work find it increasingly difficult to maintain a full-time working schedule; their mobility is deteriorating and often depression can be heaped on top of this critical physical condition.
So what is happening to help? Well, different countries in Europe have dealt with this in different ways and we know that in Germany the government is contributing to the funding for survivors via the
. This is a welcome acknowledgment of their responsibility. So what then of all the other sufferers in Europe who have received little or nothing? They are still waiting for the German Government to address its moral responsibility and allocate the relatively modest, and annually decreasing, sums required. So why have we brought this here to the European Parliament? For me, it is about saying to the Commission: please, Mr Andriukaitis, help us to take this forward, help us to broker a deal that will be put in place for every single one of those victims, so that they can live out the rest of their lives in the comfort that they have been denied until now."@en1
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"Conterganstiftung"1
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