Miss Evers Boys Movie Review

Ethics is a central concept in nursing practice and research. The paper will discuss the movie "Miss Evers' Boys," which is a dramatized portrayal of the Tuskegee Syphilis Study, a notorious clinical study conducted from 1932 to 1972 by the US Public Health Service. The film's historical context and summary will be provided in the first section. The following part will present three key ethical issues identified in the Miss Evers’ Boys. Moreover, attention will be given to the legal issues manifesting in the movie, focusing on “equal protection of the law.” Also, this paper will include a reflection on Miss Evers’ Boys and the implications of the Tuskegee Study in the current context.

Historical Context and Summary

Miss Evers’ Boys is a made-for-television film that is based on the four-decade “Tuskegee Study of Untreated Syphilis in the Negro Male,” in which the US Public Health Service enlisted 412 African American men in a notorious clinical study conducted from 1932 to 1972. The film primarily focuses on Nurse Eunice Evers and her relationship with 4 of the black men. In the opening scene, Nurse Evers is in a 1972 Senate committee devoted to understanding the overt details of the Tuskegee experiments (Sargent et al., 1997). In 1930, the prevalence of syphilis in Macon County, AL, had reached near epidemic proportions. Nurse Evers, Dr. Brodus, and Dr. Douglas are treating syphilis in black men when the non-governmental organization funding their work experiences financial difficulties due to the effects of the Great Depression.

Washington agrees to continue funding the Nurse Evers and teams’ work, but on the condition that they will study, instead of treating the participants. What follows is the infamous saga of the Tuskegee Study. The four black men who are members of a dance/music group participate in the study after being informed that they are being treated for “bad blood” (Sargent et al., 1997). The men, who later identify themselves as “Miss Evers’ Boys,” are given free transportation for accepting the treatment. As the movie ends, Eva disbelieves after realizing that the men are not being treated, but decides against abandoning them. Citing the potential benefits from the study, she encourages “her” boys to remain untreated. Eventually, three of the boys either die or become disabled.

Applying Ethical Principles to Ethical Issues Identified in the Film

Autonomy

The concept of informed consent is the cornerstone of autonomy in healthcare research. Participants must be fully informed about the purpose of the study, the potential risks and benefits, and their right to withdraw at any time without any negative consequences (Ingham-Broomfield, 2017). However, the four AA men in Miss Evers’ Boys were told that they were receiving free treatment from the government, which amounted to misinformation. Besides, Evers and her team did not inform the boys about the true nature of their work.

Nonmaleficence

The principle of nonmaleficence states that researchers and healthcare professionals should do no harm to their participants or patients. Investigators must take all necessary steps to minimize the risks to the participant and to ensure their safety and well-being throughout the study (Ingham-Broomfield, 2017). However, Miss Evers’ Boys were only given aspirin or a placebo in the pretense of treatment. As such, their syphilis prognosis continued to worsen, which indicates intentionally causing harm. The men remain untreated for syphilis, although penicillin was discovered as a cure for the disease in the 1940s.

Justice

All of the men who participate in the dramatized version of the Tuskegee Study in Miss Evers’ Boys are black. Given that the federal government and researchers knew that this research would be detrimental to the participants' health, the decision to conduct the study on the black community only, and not involve whites, was malicious and advanced systematic racism. During the Senate committee hearing, Nurse Evers angrily retorts, “The PHS would never have agreed to do the study and Congress would never have voted year after year to fund the study if the men had been white … but because they were black, no one cared (Sargent et al., 1997). The researchers and sponsors did not give equal priority to the public health interests of both Whites and Blacks in Miss Evers’ Boys.

Legal Issues

The "equal protection of the law" as enshrined in the Fourteenth Amendment of the United States Constitution means that all individuals are entitled to equal protection under the law, regardless of their race, gender, religion, or other personal characteristics. Based on this, the government must treat all people equally and not discriminate against any individual or group of individuals in law enforcement. The concept of “equal protection of the law” was upheld in the depiction of the legislative hearings since the Senate Committee was committed to establishing the degree to which the study by Nurse Evers and colleagues had violated the rights of black participants and the potential impact of this research on the subjects.

The legislative hearings concluded that the study led by Nurse Evers, Dr. Brodus, and Dr. Douglas was a severe abuse of medical ethics and a violation of human rights. I agree with this verdict since the research was conducted without informed consent and caused considerable harm to the black men who participated in it. The Tuskegee Study had significant legal implications. Following this study, Congress passed the National Research Act of 1974, establishing ethical guidelines for behavioral and biomedical research (Centers for Disease Control and Prevention, 2021). Also, several regulations were created in 1974 to enforce the principle of informed consent for studies involving human participation and experimentation.

Reflection

Today’s society would not tolerate an outright unethical study that is only conducted on African Americans. Contrary to the past, when some races were considered less human, a study similar to the Tuskegee experiments would attract immense criticism domestically and internationally. Moreover, since the Tuskegee Study, there has been a shift towards diversity and equity. American society today expects that clinical trials and other research studies are representative of the diverse populations they are intended to serve.

Watching Miss Evers’ Boys was a very emotional and disturbing experience. I felt a sense of disbelief and disappointment that such a study could have been allowed to occur, and that its participants were subjected to so much harm and suffering. Nurse Evers plays a crucial role as a link between the study team and patients due to her ability to establish trust with the participants and her expertise in keeping them engaged in the study. I empathize with her position as she experiences cognitive dissonance during the studies. If I found myself in a situation that mirrors Nurse Evers', I would refrain from participating in the research since my personal values and ethical standards would be compromised. Also, I would take steps to protect the patients and report relevant issues to the appropriate authorities, such as the Institutional Review Board (IRB).

In order to ensure unbiased and accurate results in medical research, it is important to follow strict ethical principles and to adhere to established research protocols. Double-blind studies are one such research design that can help to ensure that results are not influenced by the expectations or biases of the researchers.

In conclusion, Miss Evers’ Boys is a made-for-television film about the notorious and infamous Tuskegee Study, which is known across healthcare-related professional, research, and academic communities. The study involved blatant violation of medical ethics. A positive outcome of the experiment was the creation of policies and regulations to protect human subjects in behavioral and biomedical research. The legacy of the Tuskegee Syphilis Study serves as a call to action for healthcare providers to always put their patients' needs first and strive for excellence in ethical practices in medical research.