Really, the Thalidomide case is more of an example of why "animal" testing is shit. They're like us enough to rely on experiments on them, but not like us enough to care about their suffering? Bullshit. You want results, use non-functioning, head-banging human retards instead. More ethical all the way around, and the results will be more sure for a human, because wE'rE nOt RaTs, at least when the results aren't something humans want to see (as in the psychological studies that have unfortunate implications for humans. I like how people expected rats in the Universe 25-like experiments to arrange themselves as if they weren't social, and were surprised that they clustered in "cities", rather than just individually claiming territory and spreading out equally. Gee, I guess they would expect humans in a Gilligan's Island situation to not work together, too? Dumbassed supremacists.)
Really, the Thalidomide case is more of an example of why "animal" testing is shit. They're like us enough to rely on experiments on them, but not like us enough to care about their suffering? Bullshit. You want results, use non-functioning, head-banging human retards instead. More ethical all the way around, and the results will be more sure for a human, because wE'rE nOt RaTs, at least when the results aren't something humans want to see (as in the psychological studies that have unfortunate implications for humans.)