Shared by a valued PFAnetwork member, Karen Fernandes.
National DES Awareness Week – April 19–25, 2026.
April 2026 marks a solemn milestone — 55 years since physicians at Massachusetts General Hospital first linked prenatal exposure to Diethylstilbestrol (DES) with rare reproductive cancers. Once hailed as a “miracle drug” it was prescribed to millions of pregnant women. DES is now recognized as one of the most devastating drug disasters in medical history — a multigenerational tragedy still unfolding.
Designated by President Ronald Reagan in 1985, National DES Awareness Week continues to highlight the lasting physical and emotional toll endured by the DES-exposed community — women, mothers, sons, daughters, and now grandchildren — as scientific evidence confirms genetic damage continues across generations.
“DES changed my DNA before I was born,” says Karen a DES daughter. “Fifty years later, we’re still living with the consequences — cancers, infertility, miscarriages, and autoimmune disease and other health conditions. The silence from those responsible has been deafening.”
Key Developments:
New Federal Diagnosis Code: ICD-10-CM Code Z91.B, officially recognizing for the DES Exposed: “Personal risk factor of exposure to diethylstilbestrol.”
Congressional resolution: Res. 342 (2025), introduced by Congressman Jim McGovern, acknowledges DES’s tragic legacy and calls for continued support and accountability.
Recent scientific findings: DES exposure is linked to cardiovascular disease, pancreatic and ovarian cancers, autoimmune disorders, and skeletal and genetic abnormalities. Affects now seen in the third-generation descendants.
Once prescribed from the 1940s through the 1970s to “prevent miscarriage,” DES instead caused structural reproductive anomalies, infertility, and cancers in those exposed in the womb. DES was also prescribed to dry up lactation, as a morning after pill and to stunt the growth on young girls. These DES Women are at risk for breast and cervical cancers. Despite decades of evidence, there has been no corporate apology or organized national compensation for the affected DES Exposed and their families.