He published a letter on the teratogenicity of thalidomide[1][2][3][4] following the findings of a midwife named Pat Sparrow,[5] which resulted in the reduction of the number of drugs prescribed during pregnancy.
Later in his life, McBride was involved in several trials with the pharma industry accusing him of medical malpractice and scientific fraud for falsifying data in a paper that claimed that the drug Debendox was also responsible for birth defects.
[7][8] McBride published a letter in The Lancet, in December 1961, noting a large number of birth defects in children of patients who were prescribed thalidomide,[9] after a midwife named Sister Pat Sparrow first suspected the drug was causing birth defects in the babies of patients under his care at Crown Street Women's Hospital in Sydney.
[10] McBride was awarded a medal and prize money by L'Institut de la Vie, a prestigious French institute, in connection with his discovery, in 1971.
This work was published in the journal "Pharmacology and Toxicology" in 1999 and has been rated in the top ten of the most important Australian medical discoveries.