Tuskegee syphilis experiment

The Tuskegee syphilis experiment was a study conducted between 1932 and 1972 on American Black men who already had syphilis, but without symptoms and not infectious, with the purpose to examine the untreated history of the disease. They were given free full physical examinations and treated for any disease other than syphilis.

It is now often cited as an example of racism.

Even politically correct sources state that some allegations are false, such as Blacks being deliberately infected by syphilis during the study.

There are various less politically correct criticisms of the politically correct descriptions, such as the involvement of Blacks in running the study, the involvement of “progressives” who wanted to fight a disease that afflicted many Blacks, and it being stated to be dubious that the treatments at the time or for these particular patients would have been beneficial, possibly even harmful with early treatments involving injecting arsenic.

Jared Taylor writes that "By the mid-1950s, however, penicillin became available as a standard cure for syphilis. Should not the Public Health Service have stopped the study and treated the men? Wasn’t it “racist” not to? No. By the 1950s, the men had been infected for 20 or 25 years. Some number had died of heart disease probably brought on by tertiary syphilis, but for those who were still alive in the 1950s, the disease had very likely run its course. Ninety men were still part of the program at the time of the last examination in 1963. Penicillin treatment, even when it first became available, would probably have done them no good. Prof. Shweder suggests that by then these men may well have had life expectancies as high as black men of the same age who had never had syphilis at all! It is possible, of course, to criticize the study on the grounds that its subjects did not give “informed consent." [...] However, as Professor Shweder points out, the concept of “informed consent” did not exist in 1932. It was common for doctors to tell their patients very little, whether they were black or white. Shweder goes on to argue that since there was little harm to the men and some benefit, the Public Health Service would probably have had no shortage of subjects even if it had explained every detail at every stage."

Furthermore, the politically correct descriptions are argued to have caused various stated harmful effects for Blacks in general, such as contributing to Black reluctance to visit doctors, give blood, donate organs, get checked for HIV, etc.

External links

• The Truth About Tuskegee
• VOX (!) Debunks Tuskegee Libel In Honor Of Black History Month—Like VDARE.com Did 16 Years Ago!
• Captain America, Marvel Comics’ PC Makeover, And The Tuskegee Libel