Guatemala syphilis experiment
Guatemala
A Work Projects Administration poster about syphilis circa 1940.
The syphilis experiments in Guatemala were United
States-led human experiments conducted in Guatemala
from 1946 to 1948, during the administration of
President Truman and President Juan José Arévalo with
the cooperation of some Guatemalan health ministries
and officials.[1] Doctors infected soldiers, prostitutes,
prisoners and mental patients with syphilis and other
sexually transmitted diseases, without the informed con-
sent of the subjects, and treated most subjects with
antibiotics. This resulted in at least 83 deaths.[2] In Octo-
ber 2010, the U.S. formally apologized to Guatemala for
conducting these experiments.
1 Experiments
The experiments were led by United States Public Health rules prohibit conducting
Service physician John Charles Cutler, who later took
part in the late stages of the Tuskegee syphilis exper- The study appears to have ended in 1948, partly because
iment.[3] In archived documents, Dr. Thomas Parran,
Jr., the U.S. Surgeon General at the time of the exper-
iments, acknowledged that the Guatemalan work could
not be done domestically, and details were hidden from
Guatemalan officials.[4][5]
The experiments were funded by a grant from the U.S.
National Institutes of Health (NIH) to the Pan Ameri-
can Sanitary Bureau and involved multiple Guatemalan
government ministries.[1] A total of about 1500 study
subjects were involved although the findings were never
published.[1]
Information about these experiments was uncovered by
Professor Susan Mokotoff Reverby of Wellesley College.
Reverby found the documents in 2005 while researching
the Tuskegee syphilis study, in Cutler’s archived papers,
and shared her findings with United States government
officials.[1][4]
While the Tuskegee experiment followed the natural
progression of syphilis in those already infected, in
Guatemala doctors deliberately infected healthy people
with the diseases, some of which can be fatal if un-
treated. The goal of the study seems to have been to
determine the effect of penicillin in the prevention and
treatment of venereal diseases. The researchers paid
prostitutes infected with syphilis to have sex with pris-
oners and some subjects were infected by directly inocu-
lating them with the bacterium.[1] When the subjects con-
tracted the disease they were given antibiotics. Although
adequate penicillin therapy was prescribed for 76% of
subjects, completion of therapy was documented for only
26%. Francis Collins, the NIH director at the time of
the revelations, called the experiments “a dark chap-
ter in history of medicine” and commented that modern
[6]
human subject research without
informed consent.
1
2 4
of medical “gossip” about the work, and partly because
penicillin was very costly. However, some follow-up lab-
oratory testing and patient observation continued until the
early 1950s.
Additionally, similar research was also conducted on Human rights activists have called for subjects’ families
the transmission and prophylaxis of gonorrhea and to be compensated.[3]
chancroid.[7] The subjects for all of the STD experiments
consisted of female sex workers, prisoners, soldiers, and
mental hospital patients; the Centers for Disease Control 3 See also
and Prevention acknowledges that “the design and con-
duct of the studies was unethical in many respects, in-
cluding deliberate exposure of subjects to known serious
health threats, lack of knowledge of and consent for ex-
perimental procedures by study subjects, and the use of
highly vulnerable populations.”[7]
2 Apology and response
In October 2010, the U.S. government formally apolo-
gized and announced that the violation of human rights
in that medical research was still to be condemned, re-
gardless of how much time had passed.[8][9][10] In a joint
statement, Hillary Clinton and Kathleen Sebelius said:
Although these events occurred more than
64 years ago, we are outraged that such rep-
rehensible research could have occurred under
the guise of public health. We deeply regret
that it happened, and we apologize to all the
individuals who were affected by such abhor-
rent research practices. The conduct exhib-
ited during the study does not represent the
values of the US, or our commitment to hu-
man dignity and great respect for the people of
Guatemala.[11]
President Barack Obama apologized to President Álvaro
Colom, who had called these experiments “a crime
against humanity”.[12]
“It is clear from the language of the report that the U.S.
researchers understood the profoundly unethical nature
of the study. In fact the Guatemalan syphilis study was
being carried out just as the “Doctors’ Trial” was unfold-
ing at Nuremberg (December 1946 – August 1947), when
23 German physicians stood trial for participating in Nazi
programs to euthanize or medically experiment on con-
centration camp prisoners.”[13]
The U.S. government asked the Institute of Medicine to
conduct a review of these experiments.[1] Separately, the
Presidential Commission for the Study of Bioethical Is-
sues was asked to convene a panel of international experts
to review the current state of medical research on humans
around the world and ensure that such incidents cannot be
repeated.[1] The Commission report, Ethically Impossi-
ble: STD Research in Guatemala from 1946 to 1948, pub-
lished in September 2011, concluded that “the Guatemala
REFERENCES
experiments involved unconscionable basic violations of
ethics, even as judged against the researchers’ own recog-
nition of the requirements of the medical ethics of the
day.”[14][15]
• Human experimentation in the United States
• Tuskegee syphilis experiment
• Medical ethics
• Porton Down
• Japanese human experimentations
• Unit 731
• Nazi human experimentation
• Nuremberg Code
• Guatemala – United States relations
4 References
[1] “Fact Sheet on the 1946-1948 U.S. Public Health Service
Sexually Transmitted Diseases (STD) Inoculation Study”.
United States Department of Health and Human Services.
nd. Retrieved 2013-04-15.
[2] “Guatemalans 'died' in 1940s US syphilis study”. BBC
News. 29 August 2011. Retrieved 29 August 2011.
[3] Chris McGreal (1 October 2010). “US says sorry for “out-
rageous and abhorrent” Guatemalan syphilis tests”. The
Guardian. Retrieved 2 October 2010. Conducted be-
tween 1946 and 1948, the experiments were led by John
Cutler, a US health service physician who would later be
part of the notorious Tuskegee syphilis study in Alabama
in the 1960s.
[4] “Wellesley professor unearths a horror: Syphilis experi-
ments in Guatemala”. Boston Globe. 1 October 2010.
Retrieved 2 October 2010.
[5] “Exposed: US Doctors Secretly Infected Hundreds of
Guatemalans with Syphilis in the 1940s”. Democracy
Now!. 5 October 2010. Retrieved 12 July 2011.
[6] Donald G. McNeil, Jr. (1 October 2010). “U.S. Apol-
ogizes for Syphilis Tests in Guatemala”. The New York
Times. Retrieved 2 October 2010.
[7] “Findings from a CDC Report on the 1946-1948 U.S.
Public Health Service Sexually Transmitted Disease
(STD) Inoculation Study”, U.S. Department of Health &
Human Services, 30 September 2010
 3

[8] “U.S. Apologizes For Syphilis Experiments In

Guatemala”. National Public Radio. 1 October
2010. Retrieved 1 October 2010.

[9] “U.S. apologizes for newly revealed syphilis experiments

done in Guatemala”. Washington Post. 1 October 2010.
Retrieved 1 October 2010. The United States issued an
unusual apology Friday to Guatemala for conducting ex-
periments in the 1940s in which doctors infected soldiers,
prisoners and mental patients with syphilis and other sex-
ually transmitted diseases.

[10] https://www.icrc.org/eng/assets/files/other/irrc_851_
weeramantry.pdf

[11] “Joint Statement by Secretaries Clinton and Sebelius on a

1946-1948 Study”, U.S. Department of Health & Human
Services, October 1, 2010

[12] “US medical tests in Guatemala 'crime against humanity'".

BBC News. 1 October 2010. Retrieved 2 October 2010.

[13] Nate, Jones. “Decades Later, NARA Posts Documents

on Guatemalan Syphilis Experiments”. NSA Archive.
The George Washington University. Retrieved 21 March
2012.

[14] Ethically Impossible: STD Research in Guatemala from

1946 to 1948, Presidential Commission for the Study of
Bioethical Issues, published 2011-09-13, accessed 2012-
08-29

[15] “Lapses by American Leaders Seen in Syphilis Tests”,

Donald G. McNeil Jr., New York Times, September 14,
2011

5 External links
• “Normal Exposure” and Inoculation Syphilis: A
PHS “Tuskegee” Doctor in Guatemala, 1946-48
• NBC Nightly News segment on the experiments,
from October 1, 2010
• Records held at the National Archives at Atlanta

• Decades Later, NARA Posts Documents on

Guatemalan Syphilis Experiments, NSA Archive
4 6 TEXT AND IMAGE SOURCES, CONTRIBUTORS, AND LICENSES

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6.1 Text
• Guatemala syphilis experiment Source: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Guatemala_syphilis_experiment?oldid=682648956 Contributors:
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debot, JamesAM, Simonxag, Invisible Flying Mangoes, WLU, KTo288, Veriss1, Tennisnutt92, Mingramh, Bsherr, Der Golem, Stepshep,
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