Ethics and Infectious Diseases – Artifact 3

In 1967, William Stewart, the Surgeon General of the United States of America said: “The time has come to close the book on infectious diseases. We have basically wiped out infection in the United States.” No doubt, the good Dr. Stewart wanted to be the guy that eradicated disease. Unfortunately, he could not have been more wrong.

Ethical issues surrounding medical research and infectious disease tie hand in hand by the very nature of research. In the grand scheme, the purpose of medical research is to cure the very disease that is under study. But, the road to that cure requires subjects. Sick subjects. Is it better to immediately cure these subjects, or study the progression of the disease? At which point does an individual’s suffering outweigh the probable survival of future patients? In the great debate of security versus individual rights, where does an individual’s right to undue imprisonment weigh less than the likelihood of them infecting others?

The most famous case of unethical medical practice is the infamous Tuskegee study. In the study, medical professionals willingly deceived participants and denied them treatment in order to study the course of syphilis. The horrible practices in this and other studies, such as the Guatemala venereal disease study, are easily rationalized with a basic understanding of human nature. For some reason, and against logic, when humans gamble and lose they are desperate to gamble again in order to justify their past losses. If they could just win, it would justify all the past means. That is the backbone of the Tuskegee study. It had to continue, it must continue, in the minds of the practitioners, in order to be justified.

The consequences of this ongoing rationalization is that the groups subjected to these studies become inherently distrustful of the medical community moving forward. They cannot see the rationalization , only the damage. In future cases, these groups are less likely to seek out medical and professional help.