The Tuskegee Syphilis Study (1932–1972)
By Cade Shadowlight
From 1932 to 1972, the U.S. Public Health Service (PHS), in partnership with Tuskegee Institute in Alabama, conducted what is now known as the Tuskegee Syphilis Study. It is one of the most infamous examples of medical racism in American history. Officially titled “The Tuskegee Study of Untreated Syphilis in the Negro Male,” the experiment followed 600 poor, mostly illiterate Black sharecroppers from Macon County, Alabama. Of these, 399 already had latent syphilis, while 201 served as uninfected controls. The men were never told they had syphilis; doctors called it “bad blood” and promised free medical exams, rides to the clinic, hot meals, and burial stipends in exchange for their participation.
The original plan was to track the men for six to nine months and then treat them. That plan was abandoned. Instead, researchers decided to follow the disease “to the endpoint,” meaning death, without offering any real treatment, even after penicillin became the standard cure in the 1940s. To keep the men in the dark, doctors lied to them for decades, performed painful and unnecessary spinal taps under the guise of “special free treatment,” and actively prevented participants from receiving penicillin from other sources, including the U.S. military during World War II.
The original plan was to track the men for six to nine months and then treat them. That plan was abandoned. Instead, researchers decided to follow the disease “to the endpoint,” meaning death, without offering any real treatment, even after penicillin became the standard cure in the 1940s. To keep the men in the dark, doctors lied to them for decades, performed painful and unnecessary spinal taps under the guise of “special free treatment,” and actively prevented participants from receiving penicillin from other sources, including the U.S. military during World War II.
By the end, at least 28 men died directly from syphilis, 100 more from related complications, 40 wives were infected, and 19 children were born with congenital syphilis.
The study only ended in 1972 after Associated Press reporter Jean Heller broke the story nationwide. Public outrage forced an immediate halt and led to a 1974 class-action lawsuit that awarded the survivors and families $10 million plus lifetime medical care.
The study only ended in 1972 after Associated Press reporter Jean Heller broke the story nationwide. Public outrage forced an immediate halt and led to a 1974 class-action lawsuit that awarded the survivors and families $10 million plus lifetime medical care.
It wasn't until 1997 that the United States government issued a formal apology, calling the Tuskegee experiment “shameful” and “clearly racist.” The scandal triggered sweeping reforms, including the creation of Institutional Review Boards (IRBs) and the 1974 National Research Act, which established the principle of informed consent in all human experimentation.
The Tuskegee Study remains the single most-cited reason for African-American distrust of the medical system.
For Further Reading
The Tuskegee Study remains the single most-cited reason for African-American distrust of the medical system.
For Further Reading
- James H. Jones – Bad Blood: The Tuskegee Syphilis Experiment (1981, expanded 1993) – The definitive, exhaustively researched book that remains the standard reference. (Amazon link)
- Harriet A. Washington – Medical Apartheid: The Dark History of Medical Experimentation on Black Americans from Colonial Times to the Present (2007) – Places Tuskegee in the broader context of American medical racism. (Amazon link)
- Susan M. Reverby – Examining Tuskegee: The Infamous Syphilis Study and Its Legacy (2009) – Written by the historian who later uncovered a related U.S. experiment in Guatemala. (Amazon link)
Cade Shadowlight
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