Why does the term “Tuskegee” get used to explain mistrust of doctors and a conspiratorial view of the government?
There are many reasons. The Study went on for forty years and is considered the longest running non-treatment study of its kind. The power of the government, not just doctors, made it possible. The men were not told they were in a study but thought they were being treated. Because the story of the Study came out in the media around the time of debates over informed consent and medical research, it is remembered. It is assumed falsely that this was done without anyone knowing about it and that the men were also infected by the government. Those who know more about African American history also link it sometimes to the assumed racial politics of Booker T. Washington, Tuskegee Institute’s founding principal. The Study is also taught in bioethics courses, in on-line ethics training for researchers, and for those involved with institutional review boards that oversee medical research. It is a word that becomes a metaphor, or a symbol, for ways in which science and medicine ignores the needs
