Why Is It Ethical To Use A Placebo?

AIDS is more common in parts of Africa than anywhere else. Drug programs that can treat AIDS in rich countries are very expensive so therefore the African nation cannot afford to treat a large group of their population due to lack of wealth. Short-course drug programs might help because they are much less expensive. Finding a short-course drug program will help prevent infected pregnant women from passing AIDS onto their unborn children.
Some say it is unethical to compare a short-course drug program to use a placebo because there are individuals hoping to be treated and get better but they are left untreated. The ones who receive the placebo are given inferior treatment compared to those who receive the real drug. Also if this was done in a rich country the new short-coming drug program would be compared to the full drug program so therefore all of the members in the experiment will get treatment where as in this experiment only half will receive treatment. …show more content…
If the placebo doesn’t harm the subjects this clinical trial will help benefit future patients especially in poor countries. Also this trial does not withhold any treatment that subjects would otherwise receive so therefore a placebo should be used in a clinical trial. While the short-course drug program may be inferior to the treatment in rich countries it can still be better than the placebo especially since new drugs are expensive. I think that placebos should not be used when there are already effective treatments out there and they are withholding those treatments because the subject must always come before the trial. However if the placebo does not harm the individual it should be used because it allows researchers to determine the good and bad effects of the drug. Having a placebo in a clinical trial will discover if the drug is better than no treatment at