<i>Human experiments on infants in the 1950s in Japan </i>

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  • 1950 年代の日本における乳児の人体実験

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<p>    This paper considers two instances of experimentation performed on infants in Japanese infant homes in the 1950s. In these experiments, healthy infants were provided with harmful Escherichia coli through oral ingestion by Nagoya City University professors and with highly concentrated lactose through tubing by Hyogo Prefectural Medical College professors. This research examines the background of infant homes, which were established as part of Japan’s postwar child welfare policy, the career of the pediatricians involved in these experiments, the influence of related industries on their research, and the processes and context within which their experiments were problematized. Following the end of the tradition of midwives sheltering infants in private maternity homes, many infants who had been orphaned, or were living in deprived conditions due to their parents’poverty, were sheltered in postwar public infant homes established inside university hospitals. Some of these infants became the subject of human experiments. Research on the dangers of certain kinds of Escherichia coli was carried out by doctors related to Unit 731 of the Imperial Japanese Army, which undertook biological and chemical warfare research on human beings during World War II. Experiments on the risks of lactose density in milk for infants was motivated by its assumed impact on the powdered milk industry, which was growing rapidly in 1950s Japan. A pediatrician and a nurse brought accusations against those performing the experiments at each of the two hospitals, and the Japan Federation of Bar Associations and a local Legal Affairs Bureau investigated the cases to prove human rights violations. The possible criminal culpability of the doctors was also suggested by one jurist in the 1950s.</p>

Journal

  • Bioethics

    Bioethics 26 (1), 150-158, 2016

    Japan Association for Bioethics

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