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From Patients to Lab Rats

Living in a world where new medications, health care technologies, and medical treatments appear each day, we also have to recognize that new diseases will sprout into existence as well. Once these unfamiliar diseases develop, a lot of research goes into the process of finding a course of treatment or an actual cure. During the research process, there are a series of test, scans, and questionnaires that have to be done to figure out what is going on within a person’s body. This research, regardless of the disease or reason has to be taken with the mindset of the patient’s improvement as the top priority. Sadly, not all patients are treated the same. Some patients who suffer from such rare illnesses are often subject to becoming research subjects. Instead of doctors providing the best course of treatment for the patient to try and maintain their quality of life, they often determine that the patient is not able to be cured and then begin using them as “lab rats”.

Not only does this situation happen in the case of patients suffering from rare diseases but it also happens within of arenas of healthcare. According to the New York Times, medical professionals were used by the Central Intelligence Agency’s (C.I.A.) for the interrogations of terrorism suspects. These medical professionals were assigned to monitor the C.I.A.’s use of waterboarding, sleep deprivation and other methods of interrogation to ensure that they stayed within the limits of the law (Risen , 2010). However, while the medical staff was conducting the monitoring sessions, they turned the detainees into research subjects by helping the agency to calibrate the level of pain experienced by the detainees during the interrogation (Risen , 2010). At this point, the medical professionals made an unethical decision to treat the detainees as research subjects rather than patients.

Regardless of what the medical professionals were summoned to do, they went against their Hippocratic Oath by helping the C.I.A. to commit harmful acts against the patients. They also did not hold true to the portion of the oath which states that would provide care to the benefit of the patient.

References:

Risen , J. (2010, June 07). Medical ethics lapses cited in interrogations. The New York Times . Retrieved from http://www.nytimes.com/2010/06/07/world/07doctors.html