Natural Laboratories - Children

Mistreatment of children brings any social issue to a whole new level of injustice. In my involvement with anti-slavery efforts in Atlanta, I have seen this proven true time and time again. For some reason hearing about a sex trafficking chain becomes one hundred times more disgusting when one discovers that those being trafficked are younger and younger, some four and five years old. There is a sacredness to children. And up until the past few years, I believed our country to be exceptional in its protection of this innocence. However, after reading articles such as the “Natural Laboraties” article, I feel towards my country as I would towards a man who I recently found out is abusive to his kids.

Alaska Native children were the subjects for the 1982 hepatitis B trial vaccine program. Many of the parents didn’t even know that their children were being vaccinated, or if they did they were ill informed, bribed, and/or misled. The mercury used in some vaccines can cause autism in children. Some vaccination procedures can even be particularly painful, especially for children. And many people end up dying after contracting the disease from a vaccination, especially in experimental practices. It is hard to believe that the government is consciously risking our children’s lives in this way. The Tuskegee case is still horrific, but at least those patients were grown men capable of making their own decisions. Children have absolutely no control over their situation. It is a weak and vile thing to take advantage of children in this way. We like to imagine that children are beyond the borders of adult pain and adult concerns, when in so many cases they are raped, abused, neglected and used as guinea pigs just the same. Not only is this just wrong, but it furthers the cycle of injustice. By treating children in this way at such a young age we are breeding mistrust. I lost so much faith in the U.S. government after reading Andrea Smith’s article. As much else as there is going wrong in the world, the exploitation of children is the last straw. I appreciate Smith for bringing it up. We need to hear about it more, in order to create a more dire effort to fix things.