Amy Goodman: From Tuskegee to Guatemala Via Nuremberg

[marmar]

from truthdig:



From Tuskegee to Guatemala Via Nuremberg
Posted on Oct 5, 2010

By Amy Goodman


News broke last week that the U.S. government purposefully exposed hundreds of men in Guatemala to syphilis in ghoulish medical experiments conducted during the late 1940s. As soon as the story got out, President Barack Obama phoned President Alvaro Colom of Guatemala to apologize. Colom called the experiments “an incredible violation of human rights.” Colom also says his government is studying whether it can bring the case to an international court.

The revelations came about through research conducted by Wellesley College medical historian Susan Reverby on the notorious Tuskegee syphilis study. The two former U.S. government research projects, in Tuskegee, Ala., and Guatemala—equally noxious—are mirror images of each other. Both point to the extremes to which ethics can be disregarded in the pursuit of medical knowledge, and serve as essential reminders that medical research needs constant supervision and regulation.

Reverby is the author of the recently published book “Examining Tuskegee,” a comprehensive history of the Tuskegee syphilis study.

Tuskegee, Ala., is in the heart of the Deep South. From 1932 until it was exposed by the press in 1972, the U.S. government conducted a long-term study on the effects of syphilis when left untreated. Four hundred men with syphilis were told that they would be given a “special treatment” for their “bad blood.” Unbeknownst to them, the men were given useless placebos, not the promised cure, and their debilitation caused by the untreated syphilis was tracked over decades. In its advanced stages, syphilis can disfigure and can cause dementia, blindness and extreme, chronic pain. It is a horrible way to die. Ten years into the Tuskegee Study, penicillin was found to cure syphilis. Yet the men were not told about the potential cure and were actively denied treatment when some of them sought it.

In Tuskegee, infected men were left untreated. In Guatemala, the opposite happened. ..............(more)

The complete piece is at: http://www.truthdig.com/report/item/from_tuskegee_to_guatemala_via_nuremberg_20101005/

[Solly Mack]

1. K&R

[leftstreet]

2. She makes a good point

What does informed consent mean inside a prison, or among impoverished people, etc

K&R

[Brickbat]

3. I heard this on the radio today. Devastating.

[EFerrari]

4. K&R