The Purpose Of The Tuskegee Syphilis Study

This experiment, conducted by the U.S. Public Health Service, was intent to study the natural progression of syphilis in African American male population. The study participants voluntarily participated in the study but the researchers did not properly inform the participants on the availability of treatment or the risks of the disease if untreated. To make the matter worse, the participants were deliberately led to believe that they were receiving treatment from the Public Health Service for free, while the actual treatment was being withheld to achieve the purpose of the research. In today’s point of view, it is surprising that even the federal agency did not respect the dignity of human rights for the sake of research. In Henrietta’s era, even the federal agency did not follow the proper informed consent procedure, and a prestigious institution like John’s Hopkins did not have any regulations or office such as Institutional Review Boards (IRBs) to govern their research protocols to protect human subjects and their rights.

The experimentation of human cell culture has been a familiar scientific practice for many years; it has helped develop the polio vaccine, tested the infection of several viruses in humans, and has been used to further research on cancer, AIDs, and the effects of radiation. Despite these seemingly miraculous developments in science, many are unfamiliar with the woman behind these discoveries: Henrietta Lacks. In her novel, The Immortal Life of Henrietta Lacks, Rebecca Skloot investigates the life of Henrietta Lacks, a poor African-American tobacco farmer diagnosed with cervical cancer in 1951. Her cells, which were found to be “immortal” (continuously growing in cell culture), were extracted without her consent, and have become one of the

In the context of medical research, informed consent provides individuals with the opportunity to accept or decline involvement in research, and thereby adheres to their right to choose. Obtaining consent from donors is not limited to simply seeking permission, but involves explaining the nature and consequences of research in an honest and understandable manner. When this aspect of informed consent is ignored, unethical research ensues. For example, during the infamous Tuskegee Syphilis Experiments, US Public Health researchers studied the progression of syphilis in African American men, under the false pretense of curing their “bad blood”. Though a treatment of penicillin was available at the time, researchers idly observed as subjects died painful, preventable deaths.

Misunderstanding regarding the details of the Tuskegee syphilis study is common, but the historical accuracy is not as relevant as the strength of the beliefs that formed as a result of the study7. Gamble (1997) argues that roots of the fear of medical exploitation dates further back in history when, the bodies of Black people in Baltimore were taken from their graves for dissection in the 1830s,three female slaves were subjected to an estimated 30 gynecological surgeries each in Alabama in the late 1840s, and folklore describing night riders who kidnapped Black people for use in medical experiments in

Around the 1900s, doctors’ experimentation on their patients that involved their consent had raised little concern. Between 1920 and 1930, Syphilis was a crucial health problem. Healthcare was offered to people who earned low incomes in the South. African Americans were normally low-income citizens in the South and they were not perceived equal to whites. They were prone to have more health problems.

According to Carol A. Heintzelman (2003, Vol. 10, No. 4), the Tuskegee study of untreated syphilis in the African American male was the longest nontherapeutic experiment on human beings in medical history. The study began in 1932 in Macon County, Alabama, where the government used 600 men in a forty-year experiment. The purpose of the Tuskegee study was to record the history of syphilis in blacks, but to ultimately determine if syphilis had the same effect on African Americans as whites. The African American men were told that they were receiving free “treatment” for “bad blood”, in which case they thought they were being treated for different ailments. But in actuality they were being injected with syphilis and watched to see how their

Through an abundance of medical and historical accounts, Medical Apartheid and The Immortal Life of Henrietta Lacks exemplify how institutional racism has shaped the lives of African Americans. From the beginning of slavery through emancipation, African Americans have overwhelmingly been at the center of unethical medical research. The vast majority of this research has been done unwillingly. For research and experimentation that received the participant’s permission, there were usually hidden elements they were unaware of. Henrietta Washington sites specific examples, ranging from experimentation on plantations to post-emancipation radiation testing on African Americans.

In response to the horrific and disgusting acts of the Tuskegee Syphilis Experiment, measures were put into place in order to prevent of a another disastrous incident from repeating. It was a political embarrassment to the government. The governing system at the time allowed the experiment to continue for decades before it was exposed to the public. Human subjects in the experiment were manipulated and exploited. It failed to protect its people and turned a blind eye to any unethical proceedings that took place during the experiment.

The Tuskegee study of Untreated Syphilis began in 1932, mainly designed to determine the history of untreated latent syphilis on 600 African American men in Tuskegee, Alabama. 201 out of 600 men were non-syphilitic just unknowingly involved in the study as a control group This study is known to be “the most infamous biomedical research study in the U.S history”. Most of these men had never visited a doctor and they had no idea what illness they had. All of the men agreed to be a participant thinking they were being treated for “bad blood” and plus they were given free medical care and meals.

Several doctors who participated in the study continued to justify the experiment. Dr. J. R. Heller, who on one occasion had referred to the test subjects as the "Ethiopian population,"(Brandt). This sounds potentially racist. In 1997, Bill Clinton finally issued his apology to the African Americans and also the federal government, Only 8 out of the 399 participants who had syphilis were still alive (Clinton).

“They recruited hundreds of African American men with syphilis, then watched them die slow, painful, preventable deaths, even after they realized penicillin could cure them” (Skloot 50). The quote connects to my claim by talking about how when scientists were experimenting on men with syphilis to find a cure (their goal) that they continued to wait and watched them die, already knowing what could cure them, which is an example of wrong and incomplete conduct. “He repeated this process with about a dozen other cancer patients. He told them he was testing their immune systems; he said nothing about injecting them with someone else's malignant cells” (Skloot 127-128).

The outcome of the groups is that the syphilitic group and the untreated group were affected the most due to fatal deaths. However, the control group was not affected by the disease (Jones,

The study would ultimately prove that everyone, no matter the color of their skin, is equal when it comes to the disease of syphilis. The intention behind manipulating the men was not for the greater good of society, but instead was for the greater good of Dr. Brodus and Miss Evers. Although the actions of Dr. Brodus and Miss Evers prove to be unethical, I also find the actions to be unprofessional. Miss Evers should have informed the men of the severity of the disease, as well as how the disease is passed from one individual to another. They failed to inform their patients of many of the risks that came along with the disease.

The experiment was executed well. Yet, there are unethical practices happened during the experiment. First, the participants were not fully informed about the experiment. The researchers did not explain to the participants the processes in conducting the experiment. The participants were not informed that they would be arrested by cops in their homes.

This study was referred to as the “Tuskegee Study of Untreated Syphilis