A guinea pig's wage. Risk and commoditization in pharmaceutical research in America.
Item
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Title
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A guinea pig's wage. Risk and commoditization in pharmaceutical research in America.
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Identifier
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AAI3231981
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identifier
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3231981
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Creator
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Abadie, Roberto.
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Contributor
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Adviser: Shirley Lindenbaum
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Date
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2006
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Language
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English
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Publisher
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City University of New York.
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Subject
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Anthropology, Cultural | Health Sciences, Pharmacy
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Abstract
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By following the commodity chain from "first in man" phase I trials to phase III trials in a North American city, this dissertation explores the relationship between the increasing commoditization of volunteer's participation in clinical trials and its effects in the way risk is constructed and managed. Fieldwork was conducted between July 2003 and August 2004 in a North American city among a group of mainly anarchist professional "guinea pigs" volunteering as paid subjects for Phase I clinical trials. In addition, research was conducted at a community based organization that performed clinical trial research among mainly poor, African American men and women testing Phase III/IV clinical trials for HIV drugs and drug regimes sponsored either by the pharmaceutical industry on a community site.;The dissertation shows that market recruitment of trial subjects led to a process of professionalization among volunteers signaled by the emergence of a group of professional "guinea pigs" who provided the Pharmaceutical Industry with the regular supply of healthy, disciplined bodies it needed to run an increasing number of trials. The prospect of "easy, quick money" was enough to motivate mainly poor, unemployed working class individuals to become trials subjects to enter into the "economy of the flesh". While volunteers are deeply aware of the commoditization of their bodies this fact is denied by the pharmaceutical industry and governmental and local regulatory bodies.;The commoditization in clinical trials research and in particular in phase I not only might expose volunteers to new and unexpected risks derived from continuous participation but also challenges major ethical principles and guidelines regulating the protection of human subjects participating in research contained in the Belmont Report. The shift from a captive population to a market-recruited population unfairly targets a particular socioeconomic group of individuals creating thereby a new type of captive and vulnerable population. Paradoxically, this is the situation the Belmont report intended to eliminate when it was formulated.
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Type
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dissertation
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Source
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PQT Legacy CUNY.xlsx
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degree
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Ph.D.
