Bad Blood: The Tuskegee Syphillis Experiments

A detailed Summary of Bad Blood: The Tuskegee Syphillis Experiments

Bad Blood: The Tuskegee Syphilis Experiments

James H. Jones is the author of "Bad Blood: The Tuskegee Syphilis Experiment." The book was copyrighted in 1981. For two years, in 1974 and 1975, Jones worked closely with Fred Gray, the civil rights attorney who brought the class action suit on behalf of the men in the Tuskegee study. He also served a short internship as senior research scholar at the center for Bioethics of the Kennedy Institute of Ethics at Georgetown University. Jones had full access to the Tuskegee Study records via the Freedom of Information Act in 1975. Jones is now a professor at Arkansas University.

This book discusses the Tuskegee Syphilis Experiments that occurred in Macon County, Alabama. The experiments started in 1932 and lasted for over 40 years. They were a result of a sudden emergence in the need for health care for black men. In the years leading to the 20th century many physicians believed syphilis would surely terminate the black race. However, they cared little about this until they realized if action were not taken the disease would spread quickly through the white race, as well. Throughout the 1920's the Public Health Service (PHS) attempted to ease the pain of the blacks in the South. Six diff

The Tuskegee Syphilis Experiments were a tragedy of race and medicine. Never before had the Americans seen such horrific experiments on humans on their own soil. The thoughts of making hundreds of black males suffer horrible pains, and forgo proper treatment of syphilis, were unbearable to imagine. The men were denied penicillin in the 1940's and antibiotics in the 1960's. Although the Doctors claimed these were experiments, they were nothing more than observations and studies. Through the torture of these men, the doctors felt a miracle treatment or cure would be found. What is even more atrocious about the situation, is that many other black people contributed to the experiments. The subjects of the Tuskegee Experiments were ignorant, for the most part. When it was discovered they had syphilis, the doctors only told them they had "bad blood," a term used by physicians of the day to describe syphilis. The black males interpreted this to mean that they genuinely did have bad blood in their veins and that the doctors would treat them as necessary. They were also blinded by the bribes of free examinations, autopsies, and even burials. But after all they had nothing to worry about right? Surely their own people, such as the marvelous Nurse Rivers, knew what was best for them. These black men were worthless, poor, and expendable, so no ethical or moral boundaries were crossed, right? And if the experiments were not based on racism, then why were no whites tested?

erent sites covering a broad type of conditions were selected to set up syphilis control programs; Macon County, Alabama was one of these. These experiments took place at the United States Veterans Hospital, on the Edge of the Tuskegee Institute's campus. In what was to only last a year, 399 black men with tertiary syphilis (all of who were in the

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Approximate Word count = 1224
Approximate Pages = 5 (250 words per page double spaced)

Category: English