CDC’s Practices Overseas Questioned

The Centers for Disease Control and Prevention have conducted foreign medical research projects without required agreements to avoid human rights abuses, the Cleveland Plain Dealer reported. The agreements serve as formal accords that overseas scientists spending federal dollars are treating patients as Americans would be treated. In a number of instances, drugs were given, samples taken and research completed without the required agreements that patients were fully informed, monitored for safety, told of known treatments and free to refuse experimental drugs, the newspaper said.