1972: “Syphilis Victims in U.S. Study Went Untreated for 40 Years.”

San Antonio Contraceptive Study conducted on 70 poor Mexican-American women. Half received oral contraceptives the other placebo. In the middle of the study the two groups were switched — none were informed that they may not receive active contraceptives. [NCBI-NIH]

1974: President Nixon signed the National Research Act establishes National Commission for the Protection of Human subjects, requiring Public Health Service to promulgate regulations for the protection of human subjects. Title 45 of the Code of Federal Regulations, later known as “The Common Rule,” requires the appointment and utilization of…

1950: Dr. Joseph Stokes of the University of Pennsylvania deliberately infected 200 women prisoners with viral hepatitis. (Acres of Skin, 1998)

Dr. Jonas Salk and Dr. Thomas Francis tested their influenza vaccine in institutionalized mental patients and prisoners in Michigan; Dr. Albert Sabin tested his live virus polio vaccine in 133 prisoners at the Federal Reformatory in Ohio; Sloan-Kettering collaborated with Ohio State University, and conducted cancer experiments in which live…

1966: Animal Welfare Act establishes ethical use of laboratory animals in research. There is no law protecting human research subjects from unethical experimentation. 1966: Henry Beecher’s article “Ethics and Clinical Research” in New England Journal of Medicine identified 50 unethical clinical studies. But it would be eight years before a…

Stanford Prison Experiment (SPE) conducted by Philip Zimbardo, Ph.D, a psychologist simulated a prison constructed in a basement at Stanford University. The 24 male subjects were screened normal Stanford undergraduates who were paid $15 a day for an experiment that was to last two weeks. They were randomly assigned to…