“I wasn’t trying to find out the penicillin“I ran into her,” he admitted. Alexander FlemingScottish doctor born in 1881. His journey had begun when he was commissioned to participate in a bacteriology treatise. As chance would have it Flemish left his work unfinished for a few days and when he returned to his laboratory at St. Mary’s Hospital in Londonobserved something wonderful: a fungus that had contaminated a test plate had inhibited the growth of the staphylococcus present on it.
Was September 1928 And Alexander Fleming I had just discovered the penicillinIt was not until the Second World War that its use became widespread, thanks to a team of oxford that after returning to the discovery of Flemishmanaged to produce it in mass quantities.
Each American soldierof the three million who landed in Normandy between June and August 1944took his dose of penicillin. Meanwhile, in his country, hundreds of African-Americans They couldn’t use it, since they were being “treated” for an experiment in United States Public Health Service it would last 40 years old with which they wanted to study how humans died from syphilis and which is considered one of the most infamous in history: the Tuskegee Experiment.
The disease
THE syphilis It is an infectious disease caused by bacteria and transmitted mainly by sexual contact. It produces ulcers and red spots, lesions of the nervous system and the circulatory system. Although treated in time, it has a simple cure without leaving after-effects, if it is not treatedmay cause the death.
In 1932treatments for syphilis They were highly toxic, dangerous and of dubious effectiveness. That is why a team from the venereal diseases section of the United States Public Health Service decided to conduct a study to see if the benefits of these treatments outweighed their toxicity and to recognize the different stages of the disease. They intended to develop treatments adapted to each of them.
The experience would be done through Tuskegee Institute and it would last eight months. The subjects would be black males from the county of MasonIn Alabamawho would then be treated with available medications. Participation in the study guaranteed them free medical treatment, transportation to the clinic, meals and burial insurance in the event of death.
Treat a patient in the experiment.
They recruited 201 healthy men Already 399 with syphilisAbove all poor and illiteratewho were not informed of anything and who were going to be deceived and left to die, with no regard for their lives. Instead of designing a study to support all patients, information about the disease was suppressed, allowing doctors study the syphilis based on the suffering and death of patients.
Lies
Initially, his intention was to collect data to draw conclusions, but shortly after starting the study, they decided to go further and study the disease progression in humans who had not received any treatment. According to the researchers, These men were already condemned. and his suffering would be for the good of humanity, transforming that longest and most infamous experiment in medical historybecause instead of being treated, they were left to die while they were being studied.
And for that they did not hesitate lie when necessary. To ensure that their calls were answered, they used every trick at their disposal. On one occasion, when they needed to play lumbar puncturesa high-risk procedure, sent patients letters titled Last chance for special and free treatmentwhile it was not a treatment.
They also deceived them by administering placebos and forced them to allow their autopsies for the insurance to pay for the funeral expenses. Perhaps the most surprising thing was that It was not a secret studysince a lot of data and articles were published as the experiment progressed, but no one raised their voice.
A cure that never came
In 1947Doctors, hospitals and public health centers across the country regularly treat syphilis with penicillin and the Henderson Lawapproved in 1943 for him US Congressordered mandatory treatment of the disease. Although several national campaigns have reached the county of Masonhe Tuskegee Experiment went ahead, banning the administration of a treatment that would cure the subjects of syphilis.
Furthermore, in 1964THE WHO demanded that everything experiments with humans will have the express consent of their participants. However, the study criteria Tuskegee They were not examined and the patients were not informed about what had been done with their lives for years.
a saving angel
In 1966, Peter Buxtunvenereal disease researcher Public Health Servicereported the situation to CDC (Center for Disease Control), but that organization ruled out any intervention in the study until the death of all participantsin order to obtain all the data for which the experiment had started.
Pierre Buxtun.
Faced with the passivity of the official health authorities, Buxtun decided to address the press 1972. The days July 25 and 26 of that same year, the Washington Star and the New York Times They published the scandal of the Tuskegee Experimentwhich was immediately cancelled. Only 74 patients were still alive, 28 they had died of syphilis and others 100 for complications related to the disease. In addition, 40 women were infected And 19 children were born with congenital syphilis.
As part of a legal settlement, Survivors were compensatedand to family members who have been infected, by nine million dollars and the promise of free medical treatment for life.
In 1974he United States Congress created on National Commission for the Protection of Human Subjects in Biomedical and Behavioral Researchto identify the basic ethical principles that should guide research with people. After four years work, the commission prepared the Belmont Reportestablishing three fundamental principles: respect for people, beneficence and justice and the regulation of biomedical research through ethics committees.
The President’s Apologies
In 1997the president Bill Clinton officially apologized White House in view of five survivors: “You can’t undo what’s been done, but we can end the silence. We can stop looking the other way, look each other in the eye, and finally say, on behalf of the American people, that what Government “It was embarrassing and I’m sorry.”
Bill Clinton with one of the survivors.
He Tuskegee Experiment Not only did it cause pain and suffering to hundreds of people, but its consequences were felt for decades, causing much of the African-Americans be wary of medical treatments and Health system of an entire country.
When the experiment was revealed, officials justified their actions and those of their colleagues by saying that They were just doing their job and that some had done it “for the glory of the Science“Furthermore, they stated that these men were subjects, not patients. They were clinical material, not patients…
