U.S. Forms Panel to Assess Protections for Human Research Participants

Improved protections for human research participants will be the focus of a new international panel. The Commission for the Study of Bioethical Issues formed the International Research Panel in response to a report last October that American scientists had deliberately infected hundreds of Guatemalan prisoners and psychiatric patients with sexually transmitted diseases in the 1940s.

President Barack Obama asked the bioethics commission to consider and report on U.S. and international standards governing research involving human subjects. The new panel includes experts on research ethics, science, and clinical research from Argentina, Brazil, China, Egypt, Guatemala, India, Russia, Uganda, Belgium, and the United States.