guinea pig kids

[shecky]

According to this, NYC's Administration for Children's Services (ACS) has allowed children under foster care to be used as guinea pigs in some drug trials. Particularly HIV+ kids.

...the drugs that were making the children ill and the children had been enrolled on the secret trials without their relatives' or guardians' knowledge.

Some of these kids come from "crack" mothers and have been infected with the HIV virus. For over a decade, this became the target group for experimentation involving cocktails of toxic drugs.

Central to this story is the city's child welfare department, the Administration for Children's Services (ACS).

At Incarnation, if a child refused to take the medicines offered, he or she was force-fed through a peg-tube inserted into the stomach.

Sounds rather nasty. Any info on this?

 

[shecky]

This article takes a slightly different angle, emphasizing the involvement of GlaxoSmithKline:
http://news.independent.co.uk/business/news/story.jsp?story=587418

GlaxoSmithKline will be accused this week of backing drug trials in the US in which underprivileged children were forced to test Aids treatments against their will.

However, the ACS (Administration for Children's Services) is deemed to be the legal guardian for many HIV-positive children. According to a BBC2 documentary, Guinea Pig Kids, to be shown on Tuesday, the ACS has forced children to be involved in these trials, removing them from foster homes if the foster parent did not comply and even physically making the children take the drugs.

 

[LostAngeles]

What was the ethical reasoning behind this?

"Hey Bob, our researchers might have found a new AIDS drug."
"Oh yeah? When can we start human trials?"
"Well... they're not real sure on these drugs being safe. It's going to be pretty hard to find willing test subjects."
"What about prisoners?"
"Nah, remember the Tuskgee experiments?"
"Damn. What's a group of people that's generally ignored and overlooked or possibly reviled?"
"Hmm... what about a bunch of crack babies? Nobody really cares about those."
"Well, considering the racial makeup if this ever comes out we might have another Tuskgee on our hands. But anyway, what about their families though? If they're with their crack mom, we can just offer her a bunch of money right?"
"Actually, most of them would be under the umbrella of Social Services."
"Social Services, eh. Hey, I hear the ACS in New York was granted massive amounts of power recently. I'll bet they'll help us out."
"Sounds good. Hey, you know, we could use monkeys in this."
"Do you want PETA up your a**? Cause I sure as hell don't. Let's get these trials started."

 

[shecky]

*UPDATE*

Fishy smells detected here.

 

[aerocontrols]

BBC News item about something in the US = Load of Crap?

Who would have guessed?