Exploitation of people not only occurs
in underdeveloped counties but as well in developed counties like the United
States. During World War Two, while the United States fought battle in the
Pacific Theater diseases like Malaria and other tropical diseases were killing
their soldiers and their need for human subjects to test for their antimalarial
drug were in high demand. The University of Chicago gathered around 441
volunteer inmates in Stateville Penitentiary near Joliet, Illinois in the 1940s. During the test on man
died due to a heart attack, but the researchers refuse to say that the bites of
mosquitoes could be a factor to his death.
This issue very well impacts Chicago because if a university like the University of Chicago had such an unethical study happen in their school what does that say about their research and the people in Chicago. This is very alarming news to hear actual people become infected with at their times a deadly disease. In the city of Chicago it is especially alarming due to the fact that many people held in these facilities are people of color. It’s a very bad circumstance that one is being put into even though they are inmate volunteers because they could have been bribed into doing so. At this moment there isn’t a clear voice for people who are fighting against this behavior in Chicago but students can always start an organization just like the one used to stop testing on animals. Exploitation of people not only occurs in underdeveloped counties but as well in developed counties like the United States. During World War Two, while the United States fought battle in the Pacific Theater diseases like Malaria and other tropical diseases were killing their soldiers and their need for human subjects to test for their antimalarial drug were in high demand. The University of Chicago gathered around 441 volunteer inmates in Stateville Penitentiary near Joliet, Illinois in the 1940s. During the test on man died due to a heart attack, but the researchers refuse to say that the bites of mosquitoes could be a factor to his death. This issue very well impacts Chicago because if a university like the University of Chicago had such an unethical study happen in their school what does that say about their research and the people in Chicago. This is very alarming news to hear actual people become infected with at their times a deadly disease. In the city of Chicago it is especially alarming due to the fact that many people held in these facilities are people of color. It’s a very bad circumstance that one is being put into even though they are inmate volunteers because they could have been bribed into doing so. At this moment there isn’t a clear voice for people who are fighting against this behavior in Chicago but students can always start an organization just like the one used to stop testing on animals. One can also take a stand against unethical experimentation done on humans by going physicians who are in favor of human rights. |
Human Experimentation in IllinoisHuman medical experimentation in Chicago and near Chicago have included pregnant women, prison inmates, and other people. In Billings Hospital, for example, in the 1940s, three people were injected with plutonium: “a man in his sixties suffering from lung cancer, a woman in her fifties suffering from breast cancer, and a 'young man' suffering from Hodgkin's lymphoma.” None of the patients were told they were being injected with plutonium. The purpose behind injecting people with plutonium was to come up with “nuclear projects…to destroy individuals”. Eileen Welsome, a woman who uncovered the stories of plutonium injected patients, wrote about the events in a book called The Plutonium Files in order to bring awareness and raise scrutiny.
During World War II, prisoners of Stateville Penitentiary in Illinois participated in an experiment in which they were infected with malaria and several drugs were tested on them. The inmates “were told they [were] helping the war effort, but not that they [were] going to be infected with malaria.” The participants were chosen based on who, “in the military’s [eyes,] had a debt to society.” Stateville experiments are seen as being unethical because the “Stateville experiments violated the Nuremberg Code. The Code states that human experimentation should benefit the research subject, that it should avoid unnecessary suffering, that the results must justify any suffering, and that it should be conducted only by scientifically trained researchers.” Similarly, at the University of Chicago, there were injections without consent. Diethylstilbestrol, a synthetic estrogen “prescribed…to prevent spontaneous abortions,” was given to every pregnant woman. According to The National Academies Press, “one-half were randomized to receive DES and the other half received placebos. None of the women were told they were part of a study, nor were they told what drug they were taking.” The results of testing diethylstilbestrol on women to minimize “a variety of pregnancies complications” was able to conclude that twice as many women taking the drug diethylstilbestrol had “miscarriages and small babies.” Human experimentation for medical purposes has taken place all over the world and affected not only those people who military officials believe have a debt to society, but also pregnant women, their unborn children, and other Chicago citizens. Experiments conducted by universities such as the University of Chicago and experiments that were conducted by Stateville Penitentiary in Illinois generally follow the pattern of experimenting on people either without consent, or without being told what they are deliberately being injected with or what drugs they are taking. Inglis-Arkell, E. (2012, February 10). A US government program secretly injected people with plutonium. Retrieved April 23, 2015, from http://io9.com/5883962/a-us-government-program-secretly-injected-people-with-plutonium
Veracity, D. (2006, March 6). Human medical experimentation in the United States: The shocking true history of modern medicine and psychiatry (1833-1965). Retrieved April 23, 2015, from http://www.naturalnews.com/019189_human_medical_experimentation_ethics.html# Comfort, N. (2009, August 4). The prisoner as model organism: Malaria research at Stateville Penitentiary. Retrieved April 23, 2015, from http://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pmc/articles/PMC2789481/ WOMEN AND HEALTH RESEARCH. (1994, January 1). Retrieved April 23, 2015, from http://www.nap.edu/openbook.php?record_id=2304&page=237 Comfort, N. (2009, August 4). The prisoner as model organism: Malaria research at Stateville Penitentiary. Retrieved May 20, 2015, from http://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pmc/articles/PMC2789481/ |