Poverty and Illiteracy: Reasons Why India Is Conned Into Clinical Trials


Bangalore: Today, India is one of the most popular destinations for clinical trials on human being as the country is filled with poverty stricken and illiterate masses. Most of them voluntarily register themselves unwittingly for a trial in untested drugs without having adequate knowledge of the drugs and its after effect, reported the AFP.

The poor and illiterate are the most targeted ones by the pharmaceutical companies as the trials can be carried out with less expenditure. If not, it would cost them hugely just for the trials.

Niranjan Lal Pathak- a factory watchman is one such victim who was unaware of the fact initially and felt lucky that he was offered a free heart treatment by a doctor in Madhya Pradesh.

One of Pathak’s family members said that the doctors told them that Pathak was being treated for a special project for free of cost and were given a condition that the family members should only approach the doctor for medicine and not the local chemists if they ran out of it. But later on, they found out that he was used as a guinea pig for untested clinical trials, as reported by AFP.