Re: MIT, Quaker Oats Settle Radiation Lawsuit

["Gibbs, S Julian" <s.julian.gibbs@vanderbilt.edu>]

RADSAFERS:
I have been around long enough to remember practices at the 
time the experiments in question were performed.  Informed 
consent was an unknown concept at the time.  As a matter of 
fact, most medical care was delivered without bothering to 
inform the patient.  Most prescriptions, for example, were 
written using cryptic latin abbreviations, making it 
impossible for the patient to understand what he/she was 
getting or its intended purpose.  It was considered 
taboo to tell patients that they had serious illness, 
such as cancer.  Motives for this secrecy were not 
clear.  Suffice it to say that everyone (well, almost 
everyone) believed that "Doctor knows best."  These ideas 
carried over into biomedical research. I am not excusing 
those practices. I am merely stating what was happening at 
the time.
The issue in the current litigation is not science.  It is 
politics.  This the lawyers must sort out.  This is the 
sort of problem that they love.

Happy New Year!

***********************************************************
S. Julian Gibbs, DDS, PhD               Voice: 615-322-3190
Professor of Radiology                    FAX: 615-322-3764 
Dept. of Radiology & Radiological Sciences
Vanderbilt University Medical Center
Nashville TN 37232-2670 Email:s.julian.gibbs@Vanderbilt.Edu