This right to avoid the imposition of human experimentation is
fundamental, and has its roots in the Nuremberg Code of 1947 and has been ratified by the 1964 Declaration of Helsinki, and further codified in the United States Code of Federal Regulations. The standard is indeed so universally recognized that it constitutes a jus cogens norm under international law.
The Universal Prohibition on Human Experimentation Without Consent
Among the horrors that emerged from the rubble of World War II were
stories of barbaric medical experiments performed on unwilling victims of Nazi
Germany’s concentration camps.
On August 8, 1945, the prevailing Allies established an International
Military Tribunal (the “IMT”). Under the aegis of the IMT, the law authorized the
creation of U.S. military tribunals for the trial of “lower-level” war criminals, such as doctors accused of conducting medical experiments without the subjects’ consent.
A U.S. military tribunal subsequently found 15 doctors guilty of
conducting nonconsensual experiments, which included the testing of drugs for
immunization against malaria, epidemic jaundice, smallpox, and cholera. “In every single instance appearing in the record,” the tribunal concluded, “subjects were used who did not consent to the experiments. . . .” The tribunal sentenced seven of the doctors to death, and the remaining eight to life in prison.
As part of its final judgment, the tribunal promulgated the Nuremberg
Code on Permissible Medical Experiments. Point One of the Nuremberg Code states: “The voluntary consent of the human subject is absolutely essential.”
This standard has since been repeatedly ratified and adopted around the
globe, in laws, treaties, regulations, and ethical guidelines for medical research. For
example, in 1964, the World Medical Association adopted the Declaration of Helsinki, which provides that human subjects “must be volunteers and informed participants in the research project.” Declaration of Helsinki at Art. 20.
The Nuremberg Code have been incorporated into
international conventions, as well as the laws and regulations of countries around the world, including the United States of America.
The International Covenant on Civil and Political Rights of the United
Nations, which went into effect in 1976, provides in Article I that “[a]ll peoples have the right of self determination” and in Article 7 that “no one shall be subjected without his free consent to medical or scientific experimentation.
The informed consent principles of the Declaration of Helsinki were also
incorporated by a 2001 Directive passed by the European Parliament and the Council of the European Union.
In addition, 35 members of the Council of Europe have signed the
Convention on Human Rights and Biomedicine, which provides that informed consent is required for a subject’s involvement in medical research.
In 2005, the General Conference of UNESCO adopted the Universal
Declaration on Bioethics and Human Rights, requiring free and informed consent for participation in medical research-oriented treatments.
The exceptions to this standard are extremely narrow, and require certification by a researcher and an independent physician that, for example, “[t]he human subject is confronted with a life-threatening situation necessitating the use of the test article”; informed consent cannot be obtained from the subject; time does not permit obtaining informed consent from the subject’s legal representative; and “there is available no alternative method of approved or generally recognized therapy that provides an equal or greater likelihood of saving the life of the subject.”
Dr. BASSEL HUMOUD HAMAD AL SABAH AND DOCTORS IN THE KUWAIT MINISTRY OF HEALTH HAVE VIOLATED THE NUREMBERG CODE AND RULING AGAINST NAZI CRUELITY
Dr. BASSEL HUMOUD HAMAD AL SABAH AND DOCTORS IN THE KUWAIT MINISTRY OF HEALTH HAVE VIOLATED THE NUREMBERG CODE AND INJECTING AN IRREVERSIBLE DNA ALTERING mRNA; NANO METAL PARTICLE CONTAMINATION; NANO CHIP TRACKING; FETAL TISSUE AND CANCER CAUSING AGENT ADJUVENTS.
Dr. BASSEL HUMOUD HAMAD AL SABAH AND DOCTORS IN THE KUWAIT MINISTRY OF HEALTH HAVE VIOLATED THE GENOCIDE CONVENTION.
Dr. BASSEL HUMOUD HAMAD AL SABAH AND DOCTORS IN THE KUWAIT MINISTRY OF HEALTH HAVE VIOLATED THE GENEVA CONVENTIONS.
Dr. BASSEL HUMOUD HAMAD AL SABAH AND DOCTORS IN THE KUWAIT MINISTRY OF HEALTH SHOULD BE ARRESTED AND REFERRED TO THE HAGUE FOR PROSECUTION FOR CRIMES AGAINST HUMANITY AND VIOLATIONS OF THE NUREMBERG CODE; WAR CRIMES; AND VIOLATING THE CONVENTIONS AGAINST NAZI CRUELTY.