Tuskegee Syphilis Experiment

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TUSKEGEE SYPHILIS

EXPERIMENT A presentation by,

Athul Mohan



Also known as the Tu skegee syphilis stud y or

Public Hea lth Se rvice syphilis stud y.

Was conducted bet ween 1932-1972 in

Tuskegee, Alabama b y the US Pub lic Hea lthSe rvice.

Exper imented on poor rural Afr ican-Amer ican(black) men.



Aim:-T o stud y natu ral progress ion of unt reated

syphilis.

Study Details:

Enrolled 600 subject s fro m Alabama

399 di seased 201 n on-diseased



F ree medica l care, mea ls and fr ee bu r ial insurance were given t o them .

Never t old the y had syphilis nor were the y t reated .

T old the y were being t reated for ´bad b loodµ(syphilis, anemia, f atigue, etc .).



A doct or draws blood fro m oneof the Tu skegee te st subject s



Stud y was cont rovers ial for reasons relatedt o ethica l matte rs

Researche rs knowingly f ailed t o t reatpatient s af te r penicillin discovery in 1940s.

Penicillin had bec ome the standa rdt reatment b y 1947 .



D oct ors had 2 ch oices:-

� (i) T reat a ll syphilis subject s and c lose thestud y

� (ii) S plitting off a cont rol group for te stingwith penicillin



In stead, c ontinued with out t reating thesubject s.

Subject s were uninfor med ab out thei r disease and it s cure(penicillin).

Also were prevented for m acce ss ing syphilis t reatment programs.





B y the end of the stud y in 1972, only 74

were a live.

40 of thei r wives had been in f ected and 19

of thei r children were b orn with c ongenita l syphilis.

Most in f amous biomedica l research stud y inUS hist ory.



Study Termination:

In 1972, a leak t o the press resulted in thete rmination of the ex per iment .

Pete r Buxt on, a vene rea l-diseaseinvestigat or in San F rancisco is consideredas the ¶whist leb lower·.



E thical Implications:

Af te r the di scovery of penicillin, which was an eff ecti ve cu re t o the di sease, the stud y continued for anothe r 25 years with outt reating th ose suff er ing fro m the di sease.

Af te r the stud y ant it s consequence s became fro nt- page ne ws, it was ended in ada y.



Aftermath:led t o major change s in U.S . law andregulati on on the pro tecti on of par tici pant s in clinical studie s.

led t o the 1979 Belmont Re por t and theestab lishment of the O ff ice for HumanResearch Pro tecti ons (OHRP).

also led t o f ede ral laws and regulati ons requir ing Instituti onal Review Boards for thepro tecti on of human subject s in studie s involving human subject s.



On Ma y 16, 1997, President Bill

Clinton for mally apologized and he ld aceremon y for the Tu skegee stud y par tici pant s where 5 of the 8 remainingsurvivor·s attended .



Thank You«

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Tuskegee Syphilis Experiment