The Wikipedia article detailing the Tuskegee syphilis experiment is a strong review of the infamous study.  I had forgotten the details.  I recommend refreshing one's memory of this fiasco, for the unethical actions of the U.S. Public Health Service medical professionals who conducted the experiment provide disturbing evidence for a common libertarian slogan: NEVER TRUST THE GOVERNMENT.

Unethical actions by the government medical professionals conducting the study comprised the following: (1) "researchers failed to treat patients appropriately after the 1940s validation of penicillin as an effective cure of the disease;" (2) "scientists prevented participants from accessing syphilis treatment programs available to others in the area;" and (3) "to ensure that the men would show up for the ... non-therapeutic spinal tap, the doctors sent the 400 patients a misleading letter titled, "Last Chance for Special Free Treatment."  Additional unethical behavior is described in the Wikipedia article.  The tally of medical harm caused by the study ultimately included 28 men dead of syphilis, 100 men dead of syphilis-related complications, 40 women (wives) infected with syphilis, and 19 children born with congenital syphilis.

The United States government response to the unethical actions of United States government medical professionals was, unsurprisingly, to increase United States government power.  "Revelation of study failures led to major changes in U.S. law and regulation on the protection of participants in clinical studies." An intriguing tidbit, which I plan to explore in a future blog post, is that fact that exceptions to the U.S. laws and regulations concerning biomedical research are "possible for U.S. Federal agencies which can be kept secret by Executive Order."

I call to your attention the website for The Nathaniel Centre.  The Nathaniel Centre describes itself as the New Zealand Catholic bioethics centre.  I am not a Catholic (in fact I am an atheist), but this website maintained my attention for longer than I expected.

The 'Bioethical Principles' section of the website naturally arrested my eye.  This portion of the website summarizes the four TJ/BC fundamental bioethical principles I have previously discussed.  No novel insights regarding the 4 principles are provided.

The website then lists several supplemental principles to the TJ/BC fundamental bioethical principles.  "From a Catholic perspective" is the wording the website uses.  These additional principles include the following: sacredness of life, the innate dignity of human life, truth-telling, common good, and preferential option for the poor.  The TJ/BC justice principle is also reanalyzed via the Catholic framework. 

The plumbline libertarian has no objection to three of these supplemental principles [sacredness of life, the innate dignity of human life, and truth-telling] because they do not conflict with the libertarian rational natural rights ethic (self-ownership, original appropriation, and non-aggression).  Also, the plumbline libertarian does not object to the other three supplemental principles (common good, Catholic justice, and preferential option for the poor) because, in the abstract, they also do not conflict with the libertarian rational natural rights ethic.  The details of the Nathaniel Centre discussion of these other three supplemental principles are worrisome, however.

For example, regarding the common good supplemental principle, the website asserts that the "commitment to the common good calls for the cooperative organization of structures that enable access to what is needed to live a truly human life: food, clothing, health, work, education, culture, information, the right to have a family, and so on."  If this "cooperative organization of structures" is a voluntary effort that does not involve aggression, then the plumbline libertarian agrees.  If, as I suspect, however, this wording refers to the State (the principal criminal organization of aggression in society), then the plumbline libertarian disagrees.

The Nathaniel Centre view of Catholic justice frankly must be opposed by the plumbline libertarian.  The website states that "a Catholic approach to Bioethics is opposed to the idea that distributions of health care services can be left up to the marketplace or according to the ability of people to pay" and notes that the "commitment of the New Zealand government to the Treaty principles of participation, partnership, and protection of Maori people in the shaping and provision of health services for Maori, is a good example of the application of the principle of justice in healthcare delivery in New Zealand."  Thus, the Nathaniel Centre supports aggression in the allocation of scarce healthcare resources, which is a crime from the libertarian rational natural rights ethic viewpoint.

Finally, the Nathaniel Centre analysis of the preferential option for the poor principle promotes "the idea that the goods of this world are there for all to share."  This is difficult to reconcile with plumbline libertarianism, because it is nearly impossible to construct a scenario in which an attempt is made for all to share scarce healthcare resources without the use of State aggression.  In addition, all such historical attempts have failed miserably.

I recommend the Nathaniel Centre website.  I learned about the Catholic view of bioethics.  Catholics need to learn about libertarian bioethics.         

The 'Human Experimentation in the United States' Wikipedia article (25 printed pages as of 07/12/2010) details numerous unethical experiments performed on nonconsenting subjects in the United States.  "Many of these experiments were funded by the United States government, especially the Central Intelligence Agency and the United States military."  The libertarian bioethicist obviously opposes human experimentation on nonconsenting subjects by any organization, but particularly repudiates the involvement of criminal gangs (i.e. governments) in such medical acts of aggression.

The article provides information on the following types of human experimentation in the U.S.: biological, radiation, chemical, psychological, torture, surgical, and pharmacological.  The minutiae of the experiments is shocking even to a libertarian.  I highly recommend this account of medical aggression.

I list below six of the many U.S. government human experiments noted in the Wikipedia article:

1. "In 1955, the CIA conducted a biological warfare experiment where they released whooping cough bacteria from boats outside of Tampa Bay, Florida causing a whooping cough epidemic in the city and killing at least 12 people."
2. "In 1953, the U.S. Atomic Energy Commission (AEC) ran several studies on the health effects of radioactive iodine in newborns and pregnant women at the University of Iowa."
3. "From 1942 to 1944, the U.S. Chemical Warfare Service conducted experiments which exposed thousands of U.S. military personnel to mustard gas, in order to test the effectiveness of gas masks and protective clothing."
4. "In studies running from 1947 to 1953, which were known as Project Chatter, the U.S. Navy began identifying and testing truth serums, which they hoped could be used during interrogations of Soviet spies."
5. "From 1913 to 1951, Dr. Leo Stanley, chief surgeon at the San Quentin Prison, performed a wide variety of experiments on hundreds of prisoners at San Quentin."
6. "In 1942, the Harvard University biochemist Edward Cohn injected 64 Massachusetts prisoners with cow blood, as part of an experiment sponsored by the U.S. Navy."