Tuskegee Syphilis Experiment

The eighth amendment to the United States Constitution, clearly states that it is prohibits the federal government from imposing cruel and unusual punishment on the imprisoned. If such a stipulation was so, how could the United States federal government not only allow, but financially support, the cruel and unusual punishment, imposed on the 400 African American men in the “Tuskegee Syphilis Experiment of the Negro Male”? Although these, poor, helpless, and uneducated men, were innocent of any sort of criminal acts, they were none the less human beings born with dignity. Those 400 African American men were simply used as human “expendables” as said by Historian of Medicine, Vanessa Gamble, in a morally heinous and ethically wrong experiment, because they were black.

            In order to fully understand the magnitude of the Tuskegee Syphilis Experiment, one must explore its’ birth as well as the time period in which it was conceived. According to Gary E. McCuen’s book “Human Experimentation, When Research is Evil”, in 1926 the United States’ Public Health Services’ (PHS) survey of incidences of syphilis began in Macon County, Alabama (45). Syphilis is a sexually transmitted infection caused by the spirochete bacterium Treponema pallidum. Within Macon County, the predominant population was uneducated lower class, African Americans, who were in the latent stage of syphilis. As a result of this prevalence in syphilis, growing tensions in public health articles on germs as revealed by Gamble; in her interview in the documentary The Deadly Deception stated, “Germs know no color line you had to take care of the health needs of black people or else they would affect white people” (Shaw).  And so government officials decided to treat the syphilitic men of Macon County. When funds decreased, a public official decided to use the rest of the money on research. Now society at the time finally accepted the abolishment of slavery, but there was still a sentiment of racial superiority amongst Caucasians. This superiority as well as the astigmatism of syphilophobia that had developed catalyzed government scientist to find effective treatment for this deadly disease. Government scientists conducted an experiment, on the 400 African American syphilitic men; without their consent. As a part of the experiment, scientist told the men that they were being treated for syphilis, but in actuality they were not. Scientists finally wanted to observe the toll syphilis took on their bodies until mortem. These government scientist and doctors causally watched for 40 years as 400 gullible and innocent men, brutally died, all in the name of “science”, without lifting one finger to treat them.

At first, when the PHS discovered a multitude of African Americans in Macon County had syphilis, treatment was given to them. The standard treatment at the time was a variety of chemotherapeutic agents including mercury rubs, injections of bismuth, arsphenamine, neoarsphenamine, and iodides (McCuen 56).  When this “Macon County Syphilis Control Demonstration Project” began in 1930, no one would have thought that the funds the project was receiving from the Rosenwald Fund, would disintegrate, do to the Great Depression.

Due to insufficient funds Taliaferro Clark, the Head of the USPHS at the onset of the program decided to shut the program down and used the rest of the funds for research. This research would entail observing men basically die from syphilis in Macon County, without any sort of treatment. Clark wrote “Macon County is a natural laboratory. An already made situation. The rather low intelligence of the Negro population, depressed economic conditions, and the very common promiscuous sex relations not only contribute to the spread of syphilis but also to the prevailing indifference with regard to treatment.” (Shaw). The writer of this research paper felt that it didn’t make sense how a government official who claims the title of a Director of Public Health, could regard a mass of people in such  away and not even consider alternate humane mediums of research.

Clark proposed the Tuskegee Syphilis Experiment in order to investigate if the disease was the same in blacks and whites. As said by speaker George Strait,” The question emerged from theories of fundamental genetic and physical differences between blacks and whites.” (Shaw) These fundamental theories stated that African Americans were genetically coded for syphilis and were considered vacuous because of the small size of their brains. Fortunately, modern scientists have proven that intelligence is not measured by the size of one’s brain. As said in Sandra K. Ciccarelli and J Noland White’s textbook, Psychology an Exploration, “… increased wrinkling of the cortex is called corticalization… is the real indicator of human abilities and intelligence.” Clearly Clark’s motivation to study the people in Macon County was not in the name of medical advancement but torture of an alleged inferior race.

The great deception of the study started when Clark decided to conduct and advertise his study at the Tuskegee Institute of Alabama. The study was advertised in a way that made it seem like it was conducted for the greater good of the county. No one ever questioned the advertisement. Historian of medicine and science, Allan Brandt explained “For the greater part of the 20^th century we assumed that what physicians and scientist were doing were morally responsible...” (Shaw).  The simple fact that government physicians were conducting the exercise was the icing on top of the cake. But in order to solidify participants in the study, scientist had to psychologically entice and trick the participants.

First and foremost, the participants were never told at any point in time of the study, that they were going to be used as being “test subjects”. Also, scientist never received any type of written or verbal consent from any or their test subjects, stating that they agreed to be part of any type of experiment. As residences of the impoverished Macon County, none of the 400 men ever received proper medical care. In order to attract these men to the experiment, they were told that they would be receiving free medical care from government doctors. Of course they were ecstatic to not only get medical care but free medical care at that. Once county residence heard about the free medical care, a multitude of men lined up, in front of the Tuskegee Institute of Alabama, for what they thought was a good deal. And so the ball began to roll!

When the men first received medical care, physicians told them that they had “bad blood” instead of telling them that they had syphilis. The men did not quite understand when doctors explained the nature of syphilis to them and so bad blood was used in the local jargon. Natives of Macon County understood bad blood as some sort of aversive illness. Physicians openly lied to these men when they said they would treat their “bad blood”. In actuality physicians, used same old remedies such as the mercury rub to “treat” the 400 gullible men.

As years passed funds once again had begun to deteriorate. Dr. Raymond  Vonderlehr became the new director of the public health services and decided to push for the continuation of the study. Vonderlehr received government financial support as well as money from the Milbank Memorial Fund to continue the project. Instead of using the same old but costly remedies like bismuth and arsphenamine, doctors gave their patients aspirin and vitamins. According to PHD Michael W King, aspirin is the acetylated form of salicylic acid. Salicylate is a common constituent of numerous medicinal plants which have been used for thousands of years to treat pain (King). It is perplexing how pain medication is used to treat a bacterium that gradually shuts down each body system. If physicians at least continued to use the old remedies, that would abet the syphilitic men to live longer.

Although test subjects began to pass away from syphilis and its’ complications, physicians continued their study. As more information was found, physicians became even more interested in the disease. Scientist wanted to see if syphilis took any neurological tolls on its victims. In order to see if this were true, doctors had to trick ad coerce their test subjects into doing a particular procedure. The local jargon for this procedure called the procedure a “back shot”. This back shot was actually a spinal tap that left patients bed bound for a week. When done wrong, patients were paralyzed. James H. Jones depicted in his work, “Bad Blood” how the men were tricked into getting back shots. Dr.Vonderlehr  described his strategy by saying:

“My idea in bring thing them in large groups is to get the procedure completed in a given area before the negro population has been able to find out just what is going on. Individual patients would be told that they are coming in for an examination but they would remain all night after we had them here, and the details of the puncture techniques should also be kept from them as far as possible.” (123)

Vonderlehr’s diabolical plan worked when officials sent out an enticing letter to the county. The letter stated:

“Dear Sir,

Sometime ago you were given a thorough examination and since that time we hope that you have gotten a great deal of treatment for your bad blood. You will now be given your last chance to get a second examination. This examination is a very special one and before it is finished You will be given a special treatment if it is believed you are in a condition to stand it.” (127)

The letter closed with the stirring exhortation stated: “REMEMBER THIS IS YOUR LAST CHANCE FOR SPECIAL FREE TREATMENT, BE SURE TO MEET THE NURSE” (127).  Jones later analyzed that the PHS would stop at nothing just to continue the experiment (Shaw).

            In the 1938, the National Venereal Control Act was passed by the help of Raymond  Vonderlehr. This act pushed for real syphilis treatment establishments. Vonderlehr purposely excluded the men in the Tuskegee study from this act. If one of the males from the Tuskegee Experiment sought out treatment from one of those establishments he was rejected from treatment and brought back to Macon County. Survivor Herman Shaw recounts how he was one of the syphilitic men who sought out a clinic for treatment and was brought back to Macon County by the infamous nurse, Eunice Evers. The film based on the TSE, called Miss Ever’s Boys, brilliantly depicts how the men trusted Evers so much, to the point that they foolishly trusted her when she told them that they are not supposed to look for other treatment. Nurse Rivers was assigned to coordinate with these clinics to ensure that the men in the study were not given treatment (Jones, 162).

            Now not only were the 400 men prohibited from seeking treatment, they were prohibited from receiving penicillin. Penicillin was established within the early half of the 1940s. The common belief of giving the test subjects penicillin was thought to do no good at all. This was later proven to be untrue. Despite official warnings that penicillin might prove harmful, not a single adverse reaction was reported among the survivors who finally received treatment (Sargent). If physicians did the right thing and gave the test subjects penicillin, men would not have died in vain.

            One after the other, the men in the syphilis experiment passed away. If they did not die from syphilis itself, the test subjects suffered from the growling complications of syphilis. Some of these complications included blindness, dementia, and severe rheumatoid arthritis. Unfortunately, researchers cited the geographic isolation of the research population to justify the

test group’s lack of access to “modern treatment” (Rusert, 156).  Although, these complications were literally killing the men of the study, each day that passed, scientist never considered to actually treat these men.

As more and more men died, scientists were eager to find out the harmful effects of syphilis on the internal organs. Scientists were simply unsatisfied with the internal images x-rays provided them. So once again doctors and scientist tricked the test subjects. They tricked the men into allowing them to get an autopsy of their bodies. The scheme that allowed scientist to acquire autopsies of their patients was basically bribery. Scientist assured patients a sort of life insurance of fifty dollars, which would enable their families to giving them the proper burial in exchange for an autopsy. (Sargent). A nurse named Marie Harper, who assisted with the autopsies, revealed that the disease conducted much more devastation on the organs (Shaw). The doctor, Harper aided in the autopsies, was much more intrigued by the devastation of organs rather than attempting to stop these experiments (Shaw).  

After forty years, the experiment that was supposed to last only six months broke out. The Washington Star, finally exposed the inhuman experiment. As a result of this break out, the Center of Disease Control (CDC) took over the operation. In 1969, meetings were held by the CDC in order to discuss the future of the survivors. These meetings would prove to be useless.

The esteemed CDC had the nerve to continue the study without treatment.  They rationalized that so much time had passed that given penicillin would not do anything (Shaw). How could the CDC come up with such a theory without trying it out? Penicillin was new to the United States at the time. The CDC couldn’t possibly know the full potential of the penicillin without trying it out.

Charles Pollard, a TSE survivor, sought out the help of acclaimed attorney, Fred Grey. Fred Grey was known for representing Martin Luther King Jr., during the civil rights movement. Pollard initially sought help in order to gain justice. With Grey’s help, Pollard acquired much more than justice. Attorney, Fred Grey, filed a law suit against the PHS. The suit demanded that reparation of $10 million dollars.  When the US federal government provided compensation to participants and their relatives in 1973, they implicitly admitted to the wrongdoing (Carmack, 91). The total settlement amount of $10 million was distributed in amounts ranging from $5,000 to $37,500, according to whether the participants were still alive and whether they had been part of the syphilitic or control group (Jones 1993, p. 217) Even though the PHS knew that they were at fault in this case, they only awarded each family less than what was settled.

Gamble once said in an interview. “Medical professionals did not see anything wrong with the study” (Shaw).  It is extremely mystifying how these professionals, did not see one thing wrong with this study. This is perplexing because the doctors within the study pledged the Hippocratic Oath. The very first line of the oath clearly states “Do no harm”. The doctors involved in the TSE should’ve taken the “Hypocrites Oath” if there was such a thing. They watched for 40 long years, men suffer from a disease, which slowly shut down every organ system in the body and then kills the carrier. These same medical professionals have the audacity to justify why they let these good people suffer for so long.

A doctor within the TSE, John Cuttler, casually justified the experiment by saying, “If you gave penicillin it would interfere with the study” (Shaw).  Basically Cuttler justifies the study all in the name of science. He completely disregards inflicting harm onto the innocent. Cuttler ultimately feels that, as said by Gamble” There lives didn’t count.” Cuttler then goes on trying to justify allowing and taking part in the TSE. But no matter how Cuttler tried to justify the study, he was morally and utterly wrong. None of the men in the study deserved to suffer the way Cuttler and the rest of his colleagues allowed them to suffer.

As the TSE was nearing its end, justice was being served to the Nazi criminals involved in the human experimentation of war prisoners in the Nuremburg Trials. The experimentation inflicted on the Jews, Poles, mentally delayed, Gypsies, and others was the similar type of experimentation inflicted on the black men of the TSE. The war crimes in World War II were absolutely looked down upon in the United States. It’s incredible how the medical professionals conducting the TSE didn’t realized how immorally similar the experimentations done in Germany were to their own. They knew that their experiment was just like that of the Nazi’s but decided to continue their experiment anyway. Author James H. Jones had an interview with  Vonderlehr regarding the Nazi and Tuskegee experimentation. When asked by Jones if Vonderlehr would make any associations with what the Nazis were doing, Vonderlehr said “Certainly not” (Shaw). Vonderlehr then looked at Jones with a wounded innocence and said” They were Nazis” (Shaw). Vonderlerhr clearly felt remorse regarding the experiment. 

Thanks to the mephistophilian doctors and henchmen of the TSE, a disgusting legacy has been left being. This legacy has left distrust amongst present day United States African Americans and physicians (Adams). Do to the TSE, African Americans cannot trust Caucasion doctors who truly want to treat them. African Americans have also developed a distain distrust for the United States government. Blacks in America feel that the government purposely introduced Acquired Immune Deficiency Disorder or commonly known as AIDs (New York: Free Press, 1993). No government can fully be trusted but a government should not be blamed for introducing a deadly virus to its people. The scars left by Tuskegee are slow to heal in the African-American community, and many blacks remain deeply suspicious of anything that approaches the emotionally charged intersection of race and medicine (Coates).

Expert testimonies have partially justified the legacy left behind by the Tuskegee Syphilis Experiment. According to Historian of Medicine and science Allan Brandt, the Tuskegee Syphilis Experiment proved to produce no scientific information that would benefit the advancement of science (Shaw). The whole experiment was a waste of time. 400 men spent forty painful and arduous years of their lives in an experiment that they didn’t even know that they were a part of, for no reason what so ever.

The author of this paper; although considered African American by society’s standards, feels that no matter what race, shape, or color you are, a human experiment of the TSE’s magnitude is utterly unacceptable. In the worlds of TSE survivor Herman Shaw,” If they knew that something was wrong than they should have done something about it.” (Shaw) No one deserves to be deceived and suffer the way the 400 African American men did. This whole experiment was ethically and morally wrong.

The story of Tuskegee is a story of oppression that has received much attention for its inherent viciousness rooted in racism (Sharma, 248).  400 African American men were the test subjects in a useless experiment. The cruel and unusual punishment the men received was inexcusable.  But in 1997, when President Bill Clinton apologized to the participants, it was graciously accepted (Hendon).