Watching a doco on SBS about experiemental drug trials performed in India that are apparently not abiding by the Neuremburg Code of Clinical Ethics.

The dishonesty and disregard for human life by drug companies is astounding, even though their apparent aim is to aid life and longevity.

Unauthorised human experimentation, using those on the poverty line who are desperate for medical help to perform these "clinical trials" without telling them that the medicines are experimental, testing drugs that aren't approved for testing in Western countries because of concerns for patient safety, denying patients already available treatments, etc.

Outsourcing gone mad?

One particularly disturbing one was a trial conducted on psychiatric patients where they were denied their regular medication, given nothing for three weeks, were not told it was part of a trial and then given the experimental drugs.

There are estimates that 2 million Indians will be part of the experimental trials by 2010. So how many people are going to be killed, maimed or emotionally damaged from it all? Nothing like people being described as a "means to an end."