Legal Commentary

U.S. Apologizes for Intentionally Infecting Guatamalan Prisoners With STD

By Jeralyn

Reprehensible news article of the day:

From 1946 to 1948, American public health doctors deliberately infected nearly 700 Guatemalans — prison inmates, mental patients and soldiers — with venereal diseases in what was meant as an effort to test the effectiveness of penicillin.

American tax dollars, through the National Institutes of Health, even paid for syphilis-infected prostitutes to sleep with prisoners, since Guatemalan prisons allowed such visits. When the prostitutes did not succeed in infecting the men, some prisoners had the bacteria poured onto scrapes made on their penises, faces or arms, and in some cases it was injected by spinal puncture.

If the victims came down with the disease, they were treated with antibiotics.

The U.S. officially apologized today. The President of Guatamala appropriately expressed his outrage, calling the tests "crimes against humanity."

Full post as published by TalkLeft on October 02, 2010 (boomark / email).