Why don't we use people on Death Row to test new drugs? How much faster would we cure aids or cancer?

I love your question and have been asking it myself for years! Apparently, regardless of what sort of heinous crimes one has committed, they are still considered human, and thus need to be treated as such. Personally, I feel that using such criminals who are going to be executed anyway, is more humane than using 1000's of innocent animals for research, not to mention that using humans for the testing of drugs, etc. for human diseases, may yield more accurate findings than testing them on animals with different types of immune systems, etc, than ours. Also, it would give these 'humans' an opportunity to do something good, useful, and meaningful for humanity and society before they die.

I think you are right - the purpose of asking a question is to reward the answer that simply agrees with you. Feel free to think those on death row should be human experimental mice, but don't pretend it is for science. They are useless as medical subjects. Report It

c_bar is correct. Your desire for revenge and torture is your own issue. Scientifically, no reputable scientist would want to use them just because it is bad science. Report It

Oh, because even though they murdered 19 people, apparently they still have rights too!

It might be considered "inhumane" to make them guinea pigs.

For some reason the Constitution says that criminals have rights. In my opinon we give criminals way too many right. I agree with you. We should have human drug trials on criminals on death row.

We have used prisoners as subjects of medical study in the past but not since World War 2. It is not ethical and it is illegal.

You are aware that the Constitution of the United States prohibits cruel and unusual punishment, aren't you?

Well for one thing they would be likely to be put to death before the tests were finished, thus making them useless as experimental subjects and delaying the results.

For another, there aren't enough people on death row to provide a large enough sample of people with cancer, aids, etc. to provide a meaningful test.

For a third, there isn't enough physical diversity in the population of death row inmates to provide a meaningful result. For one thing, there are almost no women on death row. And you couldn't have the same inmate as a subject for more than one experimental drug. And they are hardly in typical conditions in any way, including psychologically, and very often are drug users or have suffered damage from drug use, which also would make them useless as test subjects.

So -- we would not cure cancer or AIDS any faster.

There are laws of Humanity even when a person is sentenced to death.

See C_Bar's explanation for starters. The basic answer is that it just wouldn't be good or even useful science, even if you assumed it was ethical. Science is not done that way.

Ethical implications aside.

Death Row immates would not be ideal canidates to test new drugs for the same reason why they are poor organ donors. Most prisoners have abused their bodies with drugs and alcohol. Many have hepatitis, cirhosis and, other conditions.

As for testing AIDS or cancer drugs, they have to have AIDS or cancer first to test a drug on them (unless you are just testing for maximum tolerable dosage).