Ursinus Intro Ethics Blog - Section A

Instead of dissecting the situation where a pharmaceutical company wants to get their drug out on the market in the quickest way possible, so they test on people in Ethiopia, I am going to concentrate on the morality of the action. I do not think it is immoral for companies to test their drugs on subjects. It leads me to think of those cancer patients and in my case a family member, with no hope left, who agrees to test an experimental drug for a company knowing full well that it may not help. However, there are many drugs out there who are in the last phases of testing and are awaiting approval from the FDA that could very well prolong life or contain cancerous cells. These drugs need to start somewhere and if they did not we wouldn't have any of the current medications that we rely on. If the people in Ethiopia are aware that it is an experimental drug, and if they are balding, I do not see how this is immoral. Of course they are not going to test this type of drug on an unhealthy person, but they are going to test it on a person that is losing their hair. The health of the person has nothing to do with this situation and is irrelevant. It is not an experimental cancer drug where they would test the drug on someone who has cancer and is nearing the end of their life. It is simply a drug to help men who are balding. We have no way of telling the side effects of the medication, but I can not imagine anyone signing up for an experimental drug test where a side effect could be death. Therefore I see nothing immoral about a Pharmaceutical company testing their drug on people from Ethiopia who are aware of the situation and agree to become a test subject.