U.S. Government Medical Experiments of the Recent Past Revealed

Revelations of medical experiments dating from the 1920s to the 1960s conducted by the U.S. government medical community and scientific researchers came to light Sunday in anarticleby Associated Press reporter Mike Stobbe. The history of these experiments is the topic of the Presidential Commission for the Study of Bioethical Issues, convened by President Barack Obama.

Medical experiments and research were conducted on disabled, mentally ill and incarcerated people in various studies through the decades, reportsPBS Newshour. Not only were America's own citizens used for these experiments, but during the 1940s, hundreds of Guatemalan prisoners were given syphilis. This information came to light in October 2010, at which time the U.S. government issued a formal apology and necessitated the Monday convening of the bioethics commission.

The Guatemalan experiment brings to mind the infamous Tuskegee experiment that left nearly 400 Alabama sharecroppers unknowingly untreated for syphilis. One doctor in the experiment remarked that the men were no longer of use for him until they died -- the point of that experiment was to glean what information science could from the autopsies of these afflicted men.

Stobbe's research into the information of these government-funded studies began back in October 2010, when the Guatemalan experiment came to light. In his research, Stobbe discovered more than 40 such research/studies that made use of American citizens in positions least likely to be able to deny consent or understand what was being done to them. When researchers ran out of study participants within the U.S., they went abroad to find test subjects.

Famous names in research were involved in some of these experiments, including Jonas Salk, who discovered the polio vaccine. The experiment in which he was involved began in 1942 and involved giving an untested flu vaccine to men living in a state insane asylum in Michigan. These men were later exposed to the flu virus to determine the efficacy of the vaccine. Some of the men were so highly impaired that they couldn't explain their symptoms to the researchers.

In the 1940s and 1950s, it was common practice in America to use prisoners as test subjects; the 1960s saw at least half the states still allowing the practice reportsNews-Sentinel.com. By the 1970s, public opinion changed and in 1973 in a congressional hearing, pharmaceutical manufacturers testified that it was cheaper for them to use prisoners in studies than it was to use chimpanzees. This led to reform in the federal prison system; no longer were prisoners to be used in medical experiments or research.

Pharmaceutical companies took their studies abroad. In 2010, the U.S. Department of Health and Human Services reported that 40 percent to 65 percent of clinical studies are now done outside the United States. Less than 1 percent of those are ever inspected by U.S. regulators.

One of the difficulties is the importance of scientific research so that new drugs can be developed and come to the market. Through the years, the U.S. government and its citizens have demonstrated varying tolerances for research ethics. The presidential bioethics commission has announced the formation of a 13-member international panel of scientific experts to study the ethics of medical research worldwide, reportsYahoo! News.

In the coming months, expect the commission's report on the Guatemalan experiment and the international committee's report on bioethics around the globe.

Smack dab in the middle of the baby boomer generation, L.L. Woodard is a proud resident of"The Red Man" state. With what he hopes is an everyman's view of life's concerns both in his state and throughout the nation, Woodard presents facts and opinions based on common-sense

solutions.

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