10 Science Experiments Gone HORRIBLY WRONG

As you can probably guess from the title of this entry, these experiments went wrong from the very start. Between 1946 and 1948, the United States led an experiment where doctors infected 1,300 individuals with syphilis, chancroid and gonorrhea without consent. The subjects were exposed to pathogens via intercourse with infected sex workers, forced perforations of their spines and by having bacteria poured on their bodies. Of the infected individuals, only about 700 received medical treatment in the form of penicillin, leaving hundreds of people to experience the full force of these horrible diseases. At least 83 individuals died by 1953 as a result of this inhumane experiment.

#9: The Radiation Poisoning of Clarence Dally

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Today, X-rays are used to diagnose everything from tuberculosis to broken bones, therefore improving and saving lives. However, their powerful radiation can have devastating effects, as Thomas Edison’s trusted assistant Clarence Dally learned the difficult way. Dally was a glassworks expert and helped Edison develop the X-ray focus tube and fluorescent lamp. Sadly, Dally’s pioneering work is what ultimately ended his life. Due to the radioactive effects of Edison’s experimentation and Dally’s work, Dally suffered from radiation poisoning, which caused him to lose his hair and develop ulcers on his hands. Despite extreme treatments, including the amputations of both of his arms, Dally lost his life due to radiation poisoning in 1904.

As we’ve discussed before, government entities have no shortage of awful human experimentation in their histories. Between 1953 and 1973, the CIA carried out a series of mind control experiments on thousands of people to discover the effects of hypnosis, torture, abuse and psychoactive drugs such as LSD. These experiments were intended to uncover which methods and drugs could weaken people and force them to confess or offer up information related to the CIA’s investigations. The experiments were illegally carried out on thousands of unwitting American and Canadian citizens, many of whom were veterans. While the exact number is unknown, there were at least a few deaths as a result of MKUltra.

Between 1953 and 1975, the government of the United Kingdom conducted experiments on its own citizens to determine the potential impacts of biological warfare agents. Initially, the scientists of Porton Down used the simulated agent zinc cadmium sulfide over 10,000 square miles, which did not have a major impact on the citizens who were unwitting test subjects. However, in the 1960s, the scientists used live bacteria in their tests and targeted South Dorset with Bacillus subtilis as the test agent. While the exact results of these tests remain unknown, many people in the area believe the experiments caused birth defects.

Leukemia is a horrible disease that causes chaos throughout its victims bodies, so of course medications that could potentially treat the condition are of high priority. However, because of the nature of cancer drugs, they need to go through several trials before they are used on humans. Unfortunately, the experimental drug TGN1412 was moved to human trials far too early, and eight young men volunteered to be test subjects for the medication. Within an hour of receiving the drug, six of the volunteers’ bodies fell into cytokine storms, causing organ failure, soaring fevers and unbearable swelling. The patients were hospitalized for weeks afterward, some even losing body parts to dry gangrene.

#5: The Terrifying Career of Dr. Rhoads

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While there was essentially a confession of murder in regards to this experiment, the confessor never faced any consequences. In 1931, Dr. Cornelius Rhoads conducted clinical research in Puerto Rico, studying patients with blood conditions such as anemia. While living in Puerto Rico, Rhoads wrote a vile, hateful letter where he confessed to killing eight patients in his care and transplanting cancer into more. While no evidence of the crimes was found during the subsequent investigation, 13 patients did pass away under Rhoads’ care. The controversy was unfortunately swept under the rug, and Rhoads went on to be a celebrated figure in the medical field.

#4: The Washington & Oregon Prison Radiation Scandal

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It’s no secret that the United States treats its prisoner population with cruelty, treating incarcerated individuals as subhuman even if they have only committed petty crimes. Between 1963 and 1973, endocrinologist Dr. Carl Heller subjected incarcerated men in Washington and Oregon to massive amounts of radiation in exchange for a paltry $5 a month. When the prisoners were later forced to undergo vasectomies, the doctor paid them a further $100. Simultaneously, in 1963, researchers from the University of Washington subjected more than 200 incarcerated men to radiation to study the long-term effects. When the men later had children, at least four of the babies had birth defects, but the actual number could be even higher.

#3: The Monster Study

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When your colleagues are so horrified by your methods that they dub your research monstrous, that might be a sign to reevaluate. In 1939, University of Iowa graduate student Mary Tudor and psychologist Wendell Johnson conducted speech therapy experiments on 22 orphan children. During the study, eleven of the children were praised during their positive speech therapy sessions. However, the other half of the children underwent negative speech therapy, during which they were ridiculed. Many of the children who were subjected to ridicule showed signs of major psychological damage for years afterward, some for the remainder of their lives. Nearly seven decades later, the State of Iowa awarded $1.2 million to seven of the surviving children for emotional damage.

In 1801, Stubbins Ffirth began studying medicine at the University of Pennsylvania. Inspired by the 1793 yellow fever epidemic that ended thousands of lives in Pennsylvania, his research quickly honed in on the disease. Ffirth theorized that the disease was not contagious and conducted horrifying experiments, using himself as a guinea pig. He poured the vomit of yellow fever patients into cuts on his arm and even into his eyes. When that failed to infect him, he cooked the vomit and inhaled the fumes and then moved on to drinking the contaminated bodily fluid. Thankfully for Ffirth, the vomit he used was from late stage patients and no longer contained the virus, so despite his best efforts, he evaded infection.

#1: The Stanford Prison Experiment

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Widely regarded as one of the most infamously unethical psychological experiments in United States history, the Stanford Prison Experiment over several days in August 1971. The experiment mimicked prison life, with some participants playing the roles of guards and others playing the roles of prisoners. Over the course of the experiment, the guards became more and more brutal to the prisoners, causing major psychological harm, including complete mental breakdowns and zombie-like behavior. Because the experiment got so out of hand, it was cut eight days short. Although the experiment was horrible, it did positively change some aspects of how prisons in the United States are run.