In July 1962 Grünenthal employees were questioned by the Aachen prosecution for the first time. They still denied any connection between Thalidomide and the malformations of children.

By then the full extent of the epidemic was known: Between 1958 and 1962, 4,000 children were born with malformations in West-Germany alone. Only 2,800 of them survived.

Source: Chronology of events provided by Beate Kirk, in: Der Conterganfall: eine unvermeidbare Arzneimittelkatastrophe? Dissertation. Greifswald 1998.