Henry Knowles Beecher (February 4, 1904 – July 25, 1976) was an important figure in the history of anesthesiology and medicine, receiving awards and honors during his career. His 1966 article on unethical practices in medical experimentation within the
New England Journal of Medicine was instrumental in the implementation of federal rules on human experimentation and informed consent. A 1999 biography—written by Vincent J. Kopp, M.D. of
UNC Chapel Hill and published in an
American Society of Anesthesiologists newsletter—describes Beecher as an influential figure within the development of medical ethics and research techniques, though he has not been without controversy.
[Kopp, Vincent J., M.D. . September 1999 Newsletter, American Society of Anesthesiologists.]Life
Born as Harry Unangst in
Peck, Kansas in 1904, he changed his surname to Beecher in his 20s. This change was said to be for the name recognition of influential 19th century Beechers—preacher
Henry Ward Beecher and author
Harriet Beecher Stowe.
He was, in fact, related to the
Beecher family.
[Moreno, Jonathan D. Undue Risk. 2000. p 241]Education
Beecher received a BA degree in 1926 and an MA degree in
physical chemistry in 1927, both from the
University of Kansas. While it had been his goal to earn a Ph.D. in chemistry at the
Sorbonne, Henry was "persuaded" to study medicine instead.
Entering the
Harvard Medical School in 1928, Beecher received research fellowships in 1929, 1930 and 1931. Beecher graduated
cum laude in 1932. Two of his articles published in the Journal of Applied Physiology in 1933 earned Warren Triennial Prizes. These two articles and a study in Beecher's last year of college caught the attention of Harvard Professor of Surgery, Edward Churchill, M.D., who became his professional mentor. Post-college, he trained for two years under Churchill at
Massachusetts General Hospital. Henry traveled to
Denmark in 1935 to work in the physiology laboratory of
Nobel Laureate August Krogh.
Professional work
Returning to America in 1936, Beecher was hired as Anaesthetist-in-Chief at MGH and Instructor in Anaesthesia at Harvard Medical School by Dr. Churchill. Henry became an Associate Professor in 1939 and the Henry Isaiah Dorr Professor of Anaesthesia Research in 1941—the first endowed chair in anesthesiology in America.
During
World War II, Beecher served in the
U.S. Army with Dr. Churchill in
North Africa and
Italy. His experiences during the war in clinical pharmacology would inspire him to investigate placebo-like phenomena.
Medical ethics
As professor of anesthesiology at Harvard Medical School, Beecher published a 1966 article that drew attention to 22 examples of unethical clinical research that had risked patients' lives.
[Beecher, H.K., Ethics and Clinical Research. New England Journal of Medicine. 16th June 1966] Though heralded for the position of this article, he was severely criticized by the medical establishment for what was felt as an unfair generalization from a few select cases.
However, this article and the subsequent Congressional investigation laid the foundation for current guidelines on informed consent and human experimentation.
Controversy
In July 2007 the public German TV-channel
SWR claimed that Beecher was involved as scientific expert with CIA studies on human drug experiments in the 1950s and may have contributed with his work in the States and in secret CIA-prisons in Western-Germany to the
KUBARK Counterintelligence Interrogation document of 1963.
[ Koch, Egmont R.: Documentary (English: Torture Experts—The Secret Methods of the CIA), TV-Documentary in public German Television SWR about secret CIA-prisons in post-war Germany, released on the 9th of July 2007, Showing original documents from the National Archives which have been released recently, see also: http://www.swr.de/betrifft/2007/07/09/ ] .
According to these recent reports, and also according to US-historian
Alfred W. McCoy, Dr. Beecher was scientifically responsible for human experiments with drugs (e.g.
mescaline) conducted by the CIA in post-war Germany. They took place in a secret CIA-prison located in
"Villa Schuster" (later renamed to
"Haus Waldhof") in
Kronberg near
Frankfurt, which was related to the nearby US-interrogation center
Camp King (West-Germany). According to a witness, during these experiments, several interrogated individuals died. This report states that since September 1951, Beecher was frequently in
Camp King and prepared human experiments, deliberated with the interrogation-staff of the CIA (called "rough boys") and recommended the test of various drugs. Several times he allegedly met with former Nazi-physician
Walter Schreiber (at Camp King respectively in Villa Schuster) to an "exchange of ideas". Later Beecher described Schreiber in a report as
"intelligent and cooperative."The documents presented in the TV-documentation state that the US-army had sent reports about Nazi-experiments in concentration camps like
Dachau concentration camp to Dr. Beecher for evaluation. The library of
Harvard Medical School still possesses a report of the US-army about these Nazi-experiments that it inherited from Dr. Beecher, a report which he evaluated.
According to Koch, in January 1953, a depressive patient at the New York State Psychatric Institute and Hospital got—upon recommendation of Dr. Beecher—a mescaline-injection at 9:53, fell in a deep coma at 11:45 and died within half an hour
.
Placebo effect
The general literature commonly misattributes the term "
placebo effect" to Henry K. Beecher's 1955 paper
The Powerful Placebo. While this paper did not introduce the idea of placebo reactions (the term had been first used by Graves in 1920), its importance was that it stressed—for the first time—the necessity of double-blind, placebo-controlled clinical trials. In his 1955 paper, Beecher only speaks of
placebo effects on specific occasions when he is contrasting them with
drug effects. His 1955 paper constantly and correctly speaks of "
placebo reactors" and "
placebo non-reactors"; furthermore, Beecher (1952), Beecher, Keats, Mosteller, and Lasagna (1953), Beecher (1959), consistently and correctly speak of "
placebo reactors" and "
placebo non-reactors"; they never speak of any "placebo effect"; and, finally, in his
Research and the Individual: Human Studies (1970), Beecher simply speaks of "
placebos".
Published works
Journal articles
- Reprinted with commentary by Harkness, Lederer and Wikler, in Bull WHO 2001
- Beecher, H.K., Ethics and experimental therapy. Journal of the American Medical Association 186(9): 858-9,(30 Nov 1963) (Editorial)
- Beecher, H.K., Experimentation in man. Journal of the American Medical Association, 1959, 169 (5): 461–478.
- Beecher, H.K., The Powerful Placebo, Journal of the American Medical Association, Vol.159, No.17, (24 December 1955).
- Beecher, H.K., Keats, A.S., Mosteller, F. & Lasagna, L., The Effectiveness of Oral Analgesics (Morphine, Codeine, Acetylsalicylic Acid) and the Problem of Placebo "Reactors" and "Non-Reactors", Journal of Pharmacology and Experimental Therapeutics, Vol.109, No.4, (December 1953).
- Beecher, H.K., Experimental Pharmacology and Measurement of the Subjective Response, Science, Vol.116, No.3007, (15 August 1952).
Papers
- Beecher HK. Ethics and the explosion of human experimentation, 1965. In the Beecher papers, Francis A. Countway Library of Medicine, Harvard University.
Books
- Beecher, H.K., Research and the Individual: Human Studies, Little, Brown, (Boston), 1970. ISBN 0-7000-0168-9
- Beecher, H.K., Measurement of Subjective Responses: Quantitative Effects of Drugs, Oxford University Press, (New York), 1959.
