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I was told about a book "The Body Hunters: Testings New Drugs on the World's Poorest Patients" by Sonia Shah. It was published by The New Press, and it had an approving quote from Publisher's Weekly on the site. (Among others, it also had one from John Le Carre, although I don't know he has any credentials.)

The claim is that very poor and sick Africans are used for pharmaceutical testing because they're desperate and the pharma companies don't have to abide by any ethical standards. They can collect data cheap.

Is this true?

David Thornley
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    It certainly has been true in the past. You need to specify a time range for your question to have any meaning. (But also note that your question is iffy in regard to citing a "notable source" as required by site rules.) – Daniel R Hicks Feb 14 '19 at 03:14
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    @DavidThornley As it stands right now the claim you want examined is slightly amorphous. How many very poor and sick Africans are used? How poor is very poor? When I skim the opening of the book available on Amazon, I find a specific answerable claim that does not really match the claim you want examined. – BobTheAverage Feb 14 '19 at 04:17
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    The trend within the drug industry to conduct their experimental drug trials in poor countries is, as yet, in its infancy. But it is growing fast. Major drugmakers such as GlaxoSmithKline, Wyeth and Merck -- already conducting between 30 and 50 percent of their experiments outside the United States and Western Europe -- plan to step up the number of their foreign trials by up to 67 percent by 2006, according to USA Today. [Page xi] – BobTheAverage Feb 14 '19 at 04:19
  • @BobTheAverage - ??? An updated version of the polio vaccine was tested in Russia. I'm guessing this was ca 1965. – Daniel R Hicks Feb 14 '19 at 05:08
  • @DanielRHicks The second comment is a quote from the intro to the book. – BobTheAverage Feb 14 '19 at 15:34
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    I think that some phrase like "in third-world countries" should be added to the title. When I read the current title I was thinking "if a clinical trial has a fixed amount of compensation, then it would be more appealing the poorer a person is." The actual claim seems to be something much more systematic and unethical than that. – Kamil Drakari Feb 14 '19 at 15:49
  • To put things in perspective: https://www.healthline.com/health-news/strange-the-sordid-history-of-human-experimentation-101213#1 – Daniel R Hicks Feb 14 '19 at 17:35
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    "Testing in poor countries" and "testing unethically" are two different things. I'd hope an answer would address both aspects. – Ask About Monica Feb 14 '19 at 22:23
  • The [Tuskeegee Experiment](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Tuskegee_syphilis_experiment) was one of the most infamous examples of testing on poor people. Granted, it wasn't largely a "drug test" (since the "experiment" involved withholding available drug treatments), but it was an egregious example of taking advantage of already disadvantaged people. (In fact, it's hard to tell who might have profited from the "experiment", aside from the people being paid to run it by the government.) – Daniel R Hicks Feb 14 '19 at 23:26
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    Not to enter any polemic. But who is if not the poors accepting that? I am afraid it will always be as such independent of ethical regulations – Alchimista Feb 18 '19 at 13:57
  • The claim makes no sense as it stands. Drug companies aren't going to test on people who are sick with problems other than what the drug is supposed to treat. That's just asking for the drug to be blamed for adverse events that were due to the preexisting problems. – Loren Pechtel Feb 25 '19 at 05:05

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