Members of an Australian class action lawsuit who blame a German pharmaceutical company's anti-morning sickness drug, thalidomide, for causing birth defects have won the right to have their case heard in their own country. The German drugmaker Grünenthal had requested that the lawsuit be heard in Germany…Thalidomide was given to pregnant women in the 1950s and 1960s…but was taken off the market in 1961 after it was linked to birth defects…Lynette Rowe, a…woman who was born without arms or legs after her mother took thalidomide while pregnant, is leading the Australian class action against three parties: Grünenthal, the UK-based Distillers Company, which sold the drug in Australia, and Diageo, the successor company to Distillers. The lawsuit claims that Grünenthal should have known thalidomide was linked to birth defects when it was on the market.