When governments or organizations do research on infectious diseases one of the main struggles is finding a proper way to test and treat the diseases in humans. There is always the possibility that it could kill the subjects or have long lasting effects like the Tuskegee study and there have to be ways to mitigate them. Some populations also are more prone to a bias against them, for example, the Chinese community that had the outbreak of the plague in the early 20th century and it deepened the anger a lot of people already had for that community. This has happened a number of times where a group of people view another group of people as inferior which allows them to stretch the rules in ways they would not have with people they viewed as equal.
The Tuskegee study began in 1936 and lasted until 1974 most of the subjects had no idea what was going on and the researchers went to great lengths to protect the integrity of their subjects. They signed papers saying that they would participate in the experiment and they were told that they would be receiving treatment for syphillis, which they did not. This was a level of care that they would not normally be able to get in their poor area of Alabama. The study continued until the Department of Health, Education, and Welfare decided to shut it down in 1974. The study showed the bias in the American healthcare system and how little people thought of African American people.
The consequences of this study are still reverberating throughout society today. African Americans are still suspicious of the medical community because of the stories that have been passed down from their grandparents about how the doctors in the study treated them so poorly. So now we see higher prevalence of diseases in the African American communities because they still don’t trust the doctors and this leads to decreased life expectancy.