June 6, 1968

Mise Ann Landers
1000 Lake Shore Plaza

Chicago, Tllinois 60611

Dear Misa Landers:

This is in answer to your query of May 31 about the possibility that LSD
produces deformed babies.

Several investigators have reported such effects, for example Dr. William F.
Geber of the Department of Pharmacology, Medical College of Georgéa, Augusta.
Similar evidence has been reported at a number of symposia as well. It is,
however, a very difficult matter to pin down precisely, and I would have to
regard the subject as still somewhat conteoversial in spite of a great deal
of circumstantial evidence. It is, after all, not the kind of experiment
that one can do under carefully controlled conditions in man!

Swadny7

There ia one possible hazard of LSD that I can mention only as a speculation,
but which I think has to be considered seriously. We do know that human
subjects can show very long delayed reactions to individual doses of LSD.

I think the queaion is open as to whkther a fetus exposed to LSD might show
some subsequent psychotic reaction that had been delayed into his infancy.
The very least that ought to be looked into is the extent to which LSD enters
the fetus across the placental barrier, and as far as I know there have been

no investigations on this point. It also would not be an easy matter to in-
vestiggte.

If Congress continues to cut back on budgets for health research, we may never
have the answers to these questions.

Sincerely yours,

Joshua Lederberg
Professor of Genetics