VP: U.S. Conducted 17 Types of Experiments on Guatemalans

GUATEMALA CITY – The United States carried out 17 different types of medical experiments on Guatemalans by intentionally infecting them with venereal diseases in the 1940s, Vice President Rafael Espada told the press.

Officials already have data on the medical projects and the information is being investigated by the commission the vice president heads along with the collaboration of the United States, Espada said.

Seventeen types of medical experiments were performed by U.S. scientists on the mentally ill, prostitutes, prisoners and soldiers between in the Central American nation between 1946 and 1948, Espada said.

The Guatemalans were infected intentionally with syphilis and gonorrhea, among other diseases.

“We have confirmed 17 types of projects in the experiments with humans conducted in our country,” the vice president said, without providing additional details about those programs.

The U.S. government has already provided about 90 percent of the scientific information about the experiments and the documents will be opened when the commission investigating the matter is fully constituted with medical experts and translators to avoid mistakes and misunderstandings, the vice president said.

Guatemalan physicians Jorge Solares and Jose Guillermo Monroy have joined the commission, he added.

Solares will be the coordinator in Guatemala and Monroy, who lives in Paraguay, will be the liaison with the United States, the vice president said.

The investigation, which will be financed by the United Nations, could last at least six months, Espada said.

The experiments performed by the United States on some 1,500 Guatemalans were revealed on Oct. 1 and that same day President Barack Obama contacted his Guatemalan counterpart, Alvaro Colom, to express his profound regret over those acts.

Colom said that the medical experiment directed by U.S. physician John Cutler were “horrifying” and crimes against humanity, adding that the Pan American Health Organization, or PAHO, was aware of them.