 Good evening. Welcome and thank you for joining us. My name is Rebecca Brandell and I'm the associate director of the Center for Bioethics at Harvard Medical School and the director of the master bioethics program. We are pleased to welcome you to enduring ethical lessons from the past learning from the US public health service syphilis study at Tuskegee in collaboration with the Tuskegee University National Center for Bioethics in research and health care. Before we begin, we want to make you aware of a couple details of our presentation this evening. This event is being recorded and live streamed via Facebook. The event video will be posted on the Center for Bioethics Facebook and YouTube pages following this event. We encourage and welcome you to submit questions at any time, please use the question and answer feature found in the meeting controls at the bottom of your screen. At the conclusion of the presentation selected questions will be discussed. Continue the conversation with us on Twitter using hashtag Harvard bioethics. During the presentation you may also use the chat feature to share comments or to report technical issues. If you wish to share comments we encourage you to address them to all panelists and attendees so that conversation can continue with all participants. The chat is public and it can be copied or shared. If you're interested in our future events, please be sure to subscribe to our center email and visit bioethics.hms.harvard.edu. It's now my pleasure to welcome you to the second of four in an event series on racism, health, and bioethics. That is the product of work that our center has done in collaborations with our good colleagues at the Tuskegee National Center for Bioethics. This collaboration started over the summer and we have been working together to explore ethical lessons together, and we're very glad to welcome you today to engage in the conversation along with us. And with that, let me introduce my good colleague Dr. Reuben Warren, who is the director of the Tuskegee University National Bioethics Center. And before I turn it over to Dr. Warren, I wanted to mention our good colleague Dr. David Hodge from Tuskegee, who was scheduled to be with me this evening moderating our panel. However, unfortunately has come down with COVID. And so we send him our very best wishes for a speedy recovery and hope to welcome him back to subsequent events. Dr. Warren, I'll turn it over to you. Good evening, and I am just so joy to be here and let me pause as well and talk about David Hodge for 30 seconds. He's a big man, big ideas, big heart, and big thoughts so I could never fit any of those shoes that he wears. But what I did is get permission from him before we started, it was okay. And he said okay so it is all okay, and it's all good. This is a another exciting evening of talking about the issues that impact on all of us, not one of us but all of us. And I work with the Harvard Bioethics Center has been really a wonderful collaboration, and I framed it as both ethical and equitable. This evening we're talking about more than what we talked about last week, because when you hear the word Tuskegee, you don't think about or talk about the wonderful history of this phenomenal university. You think about the Tuskegee sift study, whatever that means. You talk about the Tuskegee experiment, which really was an example, an illustration of the Tuskegee Airmen and how they could do wonderful things for wonderful people. If you hear this story, don't think about Tuskegee in a vacuum. Think about it in a larger context of what we're challenged with today. You hear much about a Coronavirus pandemic COVID-19. And the very next thing that comes out of their mouths is Tuskegee. And let me tell you, they don't call Tuskegee. So they may not know what they're talking about. We're going to have this evening, some colleagues who really, really know, and we're not going to talk about the quote unquote US Public Health Service sift study at Tuskegee. We're going to talk about the men. Few people know about the men or their families. We're going to talk about how these men were kind and generous and helpful, and they were abused. We're going to talk also about how these men, when they became a part of this, I won't say the word, this so-called study, then they became organs, organ systems. They lost their identity, but we're going to reintroduce these men to you and when you talk about how that transition takes place. This is an intergenerational and inter institutional collaboration. We cannot, cannot do it without the next generation participating with us as colleagues. So I want to introduce one of our colleagues to begin to introduce our first speaker. This is our student from Harvard and she asked her, what are you doing to Harvard? She's working on a master's in bioethics. What a wonderful opportunity. So Ms. Gross, why don't you introduce our first speaker. Thank you very much, Dr. Warren. So I want to start by saying I'm so excited about this opportunity to listen and learn from our distinguished presenters tonight. Again, my name is Taylor Goss and I'm a current student of master's bioethics program at Harvard Medical School. I'm also a recent master of public health graduate and I'm thrilled to be here to help introduce our speakers. The first of which is Mrs. Lily Head. Mrs. Head is the chair of Voices for Our Fathers Legacy Foundation, a nonprofit advocacy organization founded by descendants in 2014 to remember, celebrate and honor the 623 men who were victims in the USPHS Zip List study. Mrs. Head retired as a physical education and health teacher after 31 years from the Waterbury Connecticut public school system. During her professional tenure, she was a coach, mentor and advisor for her students and colleagues. She started her own educational consultant business in 1998 and worked for the Waterbury public school system, area cooperative educational services and capital regional educational council. She is a graduate of the historic Tuskegee Institute, where she received a BS degree in physical education. Later, she received her master's degree in physical education from Southern Connecticut State University and her MS degree in education and administrative leadership from the University of Bridgeport. Mrs. Head has received numerous professional and civic awards, recognizing her leadership, educational initiatives, program management, and devoted service to the Waterbury community. I'm happy to turn it over to you Mrs. Head. Thank you so much Tyler. Good evening to everyone and on behalf, excuse me, on behalf of Voices for our Fathers Legacy Foundation, it is indeed an honor to be a part of tonight's Black History Series, Racism, Medicine, and Bioethics, learning from the past to ensure a healthier future. Thank you for the privilege. Before I begin, I would like to reference something through the eyes of my father and the knowledge of my knowing many of the men who were in the study. I will share their stories through my father's story. I will begin sharing how my father and many of the 623 men and their families learned about the study, and this being from some forms of media or the great fine. And give and to give you an idea of who Freddie Lee Tyson was, as well as the men, many of the men that were in the study, and their feelings about the study. In the fall of 1972, my brother Wallace, an Air Force Sergeant, telephoned my father to ask him about an article that he had just read in Ebony magazine about a syphilis study that had been going on for 40 years. My family had moved from Tuskegee in 1960 to Connecticut. They lived in Tuskegee for years before we had never heard of such a study. Dad remembered after being asked that some of the men he knew had suffered physically, but he never knew anyone was in a study or that they had syphilis. And they talked about the study within my family until my brother brought the article to our attention. Daddy said remembering that he had given blood samples along with several men in his small little Texas community there in Macon County, while he was a sharecropper in 1932. He didn't know anything about a study or what the study was about. A couple of days later, he received a call from the CDC confirming the fact that indeed, he was an unwittingly victim, along with 622 other human beings for 40 years. One of the questions that came to mind was how could this happen? How could any human being regard another human being as being unworthy of respect, their dignity, and humane medical care and treatment, especially from those sworn to do no harm. Many of the men who were victimized in the public health service study. My father was a man of faith. He was a son, a husband, a father, a grandfather, a brother, an uncle, a cousin, a leader, and a pillar in his church and community. He was dearly loved and gave unconditional love. My father was a man of deep moral values and everyday ethical principles. He was hardworking, independent, resourceful, and respectful of others and their differences. Soft spoken, kind-hearted, and a perfect gentleman. For my sake, he was slow to anger. All of his grandchildren, young nieces and nephews, gravitated to his gentleness and play for demeanor. He loved his wife, a phenomenal woman, Johnny May Neil Tyson, for 56 years. Together, they were proud parents of nine children. Sadly, they had an infant, Emmett, who devised six weeks after his birth. His love for his extended family, his community, and his country was steadfast. Dad worked for the United States Forest Service planting trees, building bridges, roads, and dams on depleted soil that had been stripped of nutrients from years of growing cotton in Macon County. I came across Dad's draft card, which showed that he was denied the opportunity to serve his country during World War II. I wonder why. Dad helped to build Motenfield Air Force Base where the courageous Tuskegee Airmen trained. He was a fireman at the air base until he closed after World War II. After the war, Daddy worked as a carpenter until his untimely death in 1988 due to a car accident while on his way to work. He was a very health conscious man and made sure he stayed in good physical shape and encouraged his children to do the same. This is why it was so shocking when we learned that our father was a part of the study. When Daddy learned, he was angry, he was sad, he felt shamed, confused, and disheartened. He felt rejected by the people that he had believed and placed his trust. It was painful for me to see the hurt in his eyes, not being able to know the answers and not being able to say how he could not know. But being a realistic man with wisdom and faith at 67 years of age, he was able to move on with his life. He was thankful that he had not remained in the study for very long, nor had he experienced the pain and the suffering that so many of his friends and former neighbors had in past years. Daddy had, excuse me, Daddy had congenital syphilis, you see, he never knew that because he died before we were able to check his records at the CDC. We learned this in 2008. After my father had learned about the study, several days later I asked him, how do you feel about being in that awful study? And he, speaking in his always controlled voice that required active responses from us, he said, I can't do anything about what has happened to me and the others. It is up to you all to see that nothing like this happens again to anybody anywhere. The sentence then began the journey to remember and honor their ancestors in 1999, when we gathered proudly to commemorate the 1997 National Presidential Apology at the grand opening of the National Center for Bioethics and Research in Healthcare at Tuskegee University. After several years of commemorating the National Apology, the sentence felt there was more that we could do, and we must do in order to move from the trauma and shame to honor and triumph. In partnership and under the leadership of Dr. Ruben Warren at the National Center for Bioethics and Research in Healthcare, the sentence were provided with a safe space to express painful and deep personal feelings since 2011. By participating in these intense healing sessions led by Dr. Edward and Dr. Ann Wimmerly of the International Interdenominational Theological Center in Atlanta, we were empowered to move forward from shame to trauma to honor and triumph. With much sharing and discussion, we realized that in order for us to heal and to forgive, we must remember and reflect. In so doing, we also must tell the untold story of the study truthfully. Since the foundation organized as a nonprofit organization in 2014, we have made remarkable strides in our quest in transforming the Ph.S. syphilis study, legacy, bringing good from evil acts. And to learn more about the Find It Foundation, please visit our website at www.voicesforfathers.org. The descendants can't undo the longest lasting non-therapeutic study in the U.S. medical history, or erase the abuse and inhumane treatment that our fathers endured for 40 years. But we can work every day to ensure that this horrific study is not allowed to happen again. By being included in the conversations of the day, we, the descendants, are at the table and not on the menu. We have a responsibility and a profound opportunity at this time to address why there is hesitation in taking the COVID-19 virus vaccine within the black and brown communities. It is necessary, doing this time to get involved, tell the truth, and the untold stories. To the passionate work that I am doing, along with members, each member of the Board of Directors, and the support from descendants. We, the Foundation, and the descendants of the men are moving forward, transforming the legacy of the United States Public Health Service syphilis study. And let me share just a little bit about me and why I'm so dedicated and feel so passionate about what we are doing and why we are doing it. As you have heard, I am president of the Voices for Our Fathers Legacy Foundation and has been since our organizing. I am the wife of Woodward Head, soon to be of 52 years next month. I'm the mother of three adult children and their spouses, and the grandmother of three loving children. I was born in Tuskegee, Alabama, in 1944, to two amazing parents, and in a nurturing village of extended family members. Now this just didn't happen from door to door and within my family. This was the community of Macon County. They were caring, sharing, and loving people in Macon County, the ones that we were familiar with. We knew no other. The training and teaching about truthfulness, self-worth, and dignity that I received at home was supported by my Catholic elementary school teaching. I learned first and foremost that we are God's children made into His image and likeness. And as human beings, we are deserving of love, humane treatment, and respect. Throughout my professional career, this belief shaped my life as a daughter, a wife, a parent, grandparents, sister, aunt, cousin, and friend. I grew up in Tuskegee and Macon County, Alabama, and I'm proud to say that I knew personally several of the men in the study. And after learning more about the egregiousness of the study and the effects that it has had on families and the African American communities or generations, I had to get involved. I could not stand by and not be a voice for change. I, along with all of the descendants, we have a responsibility and a profound opportunity at this moment in time to address why there is hesitation in taking the COVID vaccine, virus vaccine within our communities. It is necessary, during this time, to begin telling the truth and the untold stories. And with God's grace and mercies, we the descendants will continue moving forward, transforming the legacy of the United States public health syphilis study. Thank you for the opportunity. My, my, my wonderful, wonderful presentation. Let's give her a round of applause. Thank you. And you've heard about the men, their families, their legacies, they're ups and downs, they're good and bad. And the question is how could anybody take human beings and make them something other than human beings? How could that happen? Our next presenter will talk about how that happened. And he will talk about what he read in the archives, the CDC archives. And let us have our next colleague, Lindsey Glenn, introduce Dr. Rick Zerl. Is Glenn. Good evening, everybody. How's everybody doing? Doing good. Great. Okay, hold on. I'm trying to start my video. Good evening. Okay, so first I'll introduce myself. My name is Lindsey Glenn. I am a sophomore biology major, and with a minor in material science engineering minor. So, I go to Tuskegee. I love it. And I'm really glad to be on this panel with you guys. And I will go ahead and introduce Dr. Head, or Dr. Earl. Dr. Riggins Earl is a professor of ethics and theology at the interdenominational theological center of Atlanta University Center, where he has served for over 30 years. He earned his PhD degree from Vanderbilt University in social ethics and has done postdoctoral studies at Harvard and Boston University, respectively. Dr. Earl has done research at the London Institute for African Studies and taught religion in the university and seminary context for 40 years. He is an accomplished author and has many publications, including several related to the US ph s syphilis study at Tuskegee. Dr. Earl's work has earned him several national research awards. Among them the Lilly professor research fellowship for the academic year 2001 through 2002, which is sponsored through the association of the theological schools. Dr. Earl was appointed by Tuskegee University as a visiting senior scholar at the National Bioelectric Center and is an ordained Pete Baptist clergy who has performed pastor for more than 20 years at churches in Atlanta, Georgia and Tennessee. Dr. Earl. Yes, Miss. Thank you. Is that Miss Glenn. Thank you so much for your introduction. Good. Even a good afternoon to everyone. The we are. Thanks for the opportunity to share in this panel this discussion. Dr. Warren and Dr. Brindale and Dr. Hodge. I want to thank Mrs. head for that presentation very moving. And just so it had a warmth to it. That is rather is rather Let me say different. Mrs. had you are able to say it and it seemed to not be a lot of animosity or perhaps whatever pain you are still working with you've concealed it. And I say that because I remember sitting in on conversations from Jews who had experienced the Holocaust in Germany. The Nazi tragedy and one of the things that is many of these people were more than 50 years out of grew up as children in not in Germany. Nazi Germany and came to this country. But some of them some of them still could not talk about that tragedy. Mrs. had you have been very fourth. Very clear in your presentation and convincing to those of us who heard you at least to me that you're carrying on the legacy of your father. The noble legacy of your father and many of the men were victimized by that study. Dr. Warren asked me to say a word about the men from the perspective of the medical profession. That's that's a task in and of itself and I challenge the younger minds of the next generation, particularly some of the African American young minds that are studying now. I challenge you to go into the archives of the CDC archives that are filed away in the right here in the Atlanta area in a place called Mara Georgia right below the airport. There is the southeast region National Archives. And those papers are there. But they are tens of thousands of those records. And it's it's not easy to you really have to be committed. It has to be a labor of love to spend time and weeks and months just going through the files that were collected by those doctors over a period of 40 years from those men. One of the interesting things to me is that the men are they are I would and apparently these papers were at one time. The government I guess went through a declassification of those papers. And of course, and when when papers are declassified. It's always it leaves a such a knowledge gap. Well, let me let me put it this way and information gap about who and what because once you you see the black line that's drawn through whoever's the editor or the person who was making those judge a committee that was making those judgments about what should be not be revealed to the public. You all it creates a kind of paranoia or a a hermeneutic of suspicion to ask now what what actually did that say and what were they concealing or hiding. But let's back up and say a word about. Let's say that these men were were anonymous and anonymous for this reason that they are the study while the study was not exactly a secret study because it was it was it was in clear view of the public knowledge because some some of these studies were findings were published in medical journals or at least one medical journal. And that means that that even there were even black medical doctors who had had a chance apparently to read these studies. And what we're dealing with here. I think I heard the ethical question being raised by Dr. Warren and Mrs. had how in the name of God. Well I'm paraphrasing but how in the world could a people do this and not do this to other human beings and that's it think that question I think begets the other question or at least the reality. The reality is that the society did not the medical profession of of these United States did not see these did not see black medical patients as being fully human beings. Racism cast the cast the system of this country. The racism of this country. Allowed the medical profession to put place these people in a category that was less than human. So I it's obvious that. To treat these people or at least to respond to them met their medical needs was the government perceived that other people who were in treatment at that time perceived it with those stereotypes in the back of their minds perceived these men as being of the treatment or response to these men's conditions as be as doing them a favor. And I and in the research and writing that I'm doing now on the study. I'm struggling with. Tuskegee. As. As a syphilis, the unit, the name Tuskegee Tuskegee really takes on a syphilis problematic. It's a dilemma now that. Tuskegee the university in spite of all the good and I'll come back to that later as Dr. Warren pointed out in spite of all the good that the university did. For not just for black students, the university, the university of the Tuskegee Institute helped to save. America and I'm willing to posit that because. America has never has never. Invested as it should have in its historical black schools and yet those black schools help to save us America from a system that was a part of partied in nature. But these men were the conductors of the study took advantage of the benevolent spirit. That Mrs had talked about that these men. What are manner. Exemplified. Well, let's call it, they took, let's say this, these, the because of segregation and racism. The South produced a group of black men. Is that that were a mannable. Kind. Benevolent. In spite of the. The the demonic racist practices against them. And they had to do this in order to remain in the South. I mean, there's no way they could have been militant. And stayed in the, this part of the country. That was that. That created an ethos to destroy the manhood. Of black men. And I dare say that the syphilis study. That there were those who saw the syphilis study. As an opportunity to continue. To de-masculate. Black males. So it was not a, it did not, it was not a big problem. To do what they did. Because it was the ethos itself. Made. Made it possible. Or dictated. That this is what you do. Now these. One of the things I think needs to be pointed out. Is that. Some of these men who had syphilis. And we, they didn't know that only those who studied these men knew who had syphilis and who didn't. But. This syphilis. Study. Became because of these men. Migrating to different parts of the country. Especially the North country. This. This movement. It was one of these. Spreaders. The migration movement became one of the spreaders. Of syphilis among black people. And little or nothing has. Very little has been done. To examine that. Because you really have to go into the medical records. And it's in the medical records that you see. And that's where. Johnny X. The doctor medical doctor says, okay, so and so. As. Is a part of this. Came from Tuskegee, Alabama. In 1935. And has lived in Cincinnati, Ohio. Since then. And for those many years of however many years. This, this. Patient has gone back and forth. And the doctor, whoever the doctor is that's treating. The patient. So these. These men are. They are. They are. Considered as the doctor makes observation about the man, each patient that is being examined. And the different doctors describe them as being. Humble. Very. Manable, et cetera, et cetera. They are, they are described really as Southern. I would want to have my tempted to say Southern gentlemen, but then the gentleman has to be left off. They are good Southern. Blacks. Or at that time they call them Southern Negroes. And they knew that place and knew this spirit of humility. Now what I'm interested in knowing from these records is. How many of these men went into the military. Because this study started in 1932. And it ended in 1972. Or you had World War One. And how did. If what kind of blood tests were given. That would have prevented or how and what way did the medical community. In the military preparing. Men to go into the military. In what way did they know who had. If it was not active syphilis who had. Who had the disease and who did not. There's much study that needs to be done with these records. They become very for the people in the archives. I have been down there and worked on those records when. There is a kind of skittish kind of. Generate response on the part of the people who. Are archivist who want to know what are you doing what why do you want these you know what what are you doing with the information and of course. I have to point out that I'm a researcher scholar writer etc. So. Who were these men. One of the things that the historians. Have not pointed out is that needs to be pointed out is something that Mrs. Head pointed out. That is the faith of these men. What what what were their faith practices. And how did these faith practices factor into the equation. Into their behavior. Once they learned that they had syphilis. That they. You know and the question is how did they get it. Because you see the. The studies that I have read says that these men. The historians. Dr. Dr. The big name historian is a female out of Connecticut who did and did the work on the Tuskegee syphilis study. She did two major writings. And one of the things that I wanted to know from her is. Did you interview in it. There was a really was the question of faith and religion. In any of your questions that you interviewed with these men. I didn't get the feeling that that was for her. A real interest. Because. She. She seemed seemingly she showed little interest of. That that would be an important question. Well in the old south. This the study takes place. Less than a hundred years less than a hundred years after slavery right. So it starts. So if this is the case in the. In the south. If it's if the study happened in the south. Religion regardless of. Of how. You know it's interpreted. Religion has such a dominant. Impact on. Black. People in the south. It might have been a case where a lot of these men didn't go to church. That didn't mean that they didn't have. Religious convictions about God creation. Etc. So. This is where we are I think. We know so little. About those. Men and. Mrs. Head and her aunt her. Her group hopefully. Well. I would say Dr. Warren my hope is. They will write. Contribute in. In writing some of their memories of these. Of their ancestors. A kind of bio sketch bio sketches. Of that. And maybe we can help to. Form some of the questions that would that will be. Help to generate. Help to. Help to. Generate them or at least animate their memories. As well as. Contribute to the legacy of understanding. Who some of these men who these men were. I think I have covered. Not covered, but I think that my time is. Is about. Is is is near. Coming to a close, but let me say. The. The virtue Tuskegee as a virtue institution. And the experiment that took place at Tuskegee. As a dark. As a dark tragic. Vice. In the, in the conch in the medical profession of the nation. As a tragedy. Because if they are doing this without the men's knowledge. Then. It's a tragedy. Without their consent. But look at the look at Tuskegee institution. The institution of Tuskegee. It is. It is considered the. The first black president. I think it was the first black president. One of the first black presidents. Of a historically. Black. College or university. And that. That speaks volumes. It was considered an institution of virtue. Because. It was. It made that way by. Northern philanthropist who. The rocket fellas Vanderbilt's. No more primary rocket fellas. JP Morgan. Carnegie and. Many others of the robber baron. Generation. Who put large sums of money into that institution. To make it. To really it was. Some would call it a an experiment in. A semi kind of. Democracy or education for democracy. These. These northerners. Filthy rich people. Help to. Use that institution. To try to prove to. America and the western world. That slaves. Could be transformed. Blacks could be transformed. From slave status. To. Moral. To. To. To. To the US and. From slave status. To. Moral. Agents. And of course the moral agent is. Covers everything. But. The political right to vote. What they were asking black people at that time to do was. To lift themselves. To use. of white America. That kind of an ethos that had no political traction or teeth, it became the opportune soil for white racists and eugenics in medicine to carry out this experiment. I will save the rest for questions and answers. I meant for the question and answer moment, but that's where that's part of my contribution. Thank you. Let's thank him as well. I know there are a lot of questions and a little time, and we will start off our question and answer with our two co-moderators, Ms. Goss and Ms. Leiden. Taylor. I'm not sure if she'll want to go first, but I could go ahead and start with the first question from Lachlan. What should happen over the next one to five years so that you and we can honestly say that the memories, souls of the men who are harmed and their families are being appropriately honored and true healing is underway? What can slash should each person attending this meeting do to contribute to that? Any takers? Dr. Oro. Oh, yes, yes. Okay. I thought that was specifically to Ms. Head, but thank you. I think the question is apropos. I think what can be done is the kind of thing that's being done in this panel discussion is one step in the right direction. The other, I think, is and we want to thank the people, our colleagues from Harvard who have joined us to participate in this, but the other thing is that it has to be foundations and groups that the need is for foundations and groups to resource the project. It is almost impossible to gather, to have people who can help Ms. Head and others to especially writers and researchers to make this thing happen without the financial resources and black schools continue to have that problem. It is a part of the systemic racism in this country that young whites and other whites who are enlightened have to they have to come to the table and say, look, you know, these these schools did help save America and we wouldn't have the leadership in America today had it not been for these schools and without without giving them help and assistance in the government and and and private foundations and funding it you know you you can't you can't change the course you can't change the direction. I was so glad to hear the this issue of of black institutions and their value come up in black lives matter because so often upper middle class blacks and blacks who have been high achievers have gone to Harvard going to Yale going to Vanderbilt going to the white schools and damn it they forget the very institutions that made it possible for us to fight when there was nothing to fight with but our knowledge and some understanding that that we are human and it was those institutions who preserved us and kept helped us to keep our sanity as the as Lex and Hughes mother to son says they're you know we came to a period from slavery up until now the masses I'm speaking of where that you people have gone in the dark where there ain't there just ain't been no light there just ain't been none and we have tried with everything we have to try to help to save the democracy and we're the last people who have ever wanted to overthrow this government isn't that ironic if anybody would have had a justification to do what the mob did uh a few weeks ago and god help us it would have been the people who have who have this society has given so little I remember when the debate came up about what should be done with the book of T Washington papers and there they are just volumes of them I've read through most of the published volumes and going to the Library of Congress and read through uh you know boxes of papers etc you spend a lifetime doing that kind of stuff but the debate came up what should be done where should those papers go and that's when somebody said Booker T Washington was the greatest public servant that America has produced now all blacks don't feel that way about him because of his positions okay but at least there were people who recognized that he helped to save America and its understanding of education and that the papers should therefore the United States government should purchase those papers and place them in the Library of Congress in Washington DC and I got I veered off a little bit but I use that as an illustration to say that the kind of thing that the Mrs. Harris is doing this we need public support to make it happen and stop using the Tuskegee uh the dark side of the Tuskegee experiment as as to say well you know and when they say it they don't say it as though that it was the worst thing in the world they just say well something happened at Tuskegee that makes black people paranoid and that's the that's the that's the implied message we get paranoid about public medicine because of what happened at Tuskegee the whole the whole dog the whole dog on nation medical side of the nation ought to be upset about what happened to help happen there I know we're we are out of time we've got to have two two questions from our co-moderators Ms. Goss and your questions what we want to you pose um so I'm going to try to condense a couple of questions from the chat into a hopefully concise question um about how the medical and public health communities can start to gain some trust back from communities that have typically been harmed or exploited by the medical and public health communities and what sort of reparations um might be able to be made to help in that process what do you do at your both panelists yes whoever um would like to take that on I know it's a difficult and very large question but um if if I may I would like to um say to to to that question that if we have more conversations like this about the study as well as about all of the injustices and the inequalities that have happened to the African American community over centuries we can begin to start building trustworthiness and perhaps trust and I would like to and the only way we can do that is to begin by telling the truth acknowledging accepting responsibility and showing some accountability we need to start doing that um and I would like to um thank Dr. Earl for mentioning the importance of the foundation's work and that of the descendants it's very important what we are doing and Dr. Earl you also mentioned about the negative energy or suppressing my ill feelings about the study I have to tell you I hold none because if I remain in that place that negative energy will not allow me to move forward positively so I need to not have that I take that energy and convert it to positive energy how can I do something to make it better for the future how can I do something to be a catalyst for change and that's important that's also what my father taught me so and it was a part of my upbringing and the next thing you mentioned about not referring to the man as a gentleman or for you know being gentlemen and I sort of agree with I disagree with you on that point because I don't think being a citizen in the deep south Jim Crow Alabama was the reason why my father and so many of those other men that I knew of and knew personally were gentlemen I don't think they were of that because of where they lived at that time I think they were genuine men who treated each other with respect and also treated the opposite sex with respect the ones that I do now I'm sure there were you know others because we are all human and everyone has we all have our faults but I think the men they were they were kind and their stories need need to be told and the descendants need to know more information now descendants have visited the CDC in Atlanta we went there that was one of our trips as part of our day of healing and we for the first time were able to look and touch our father's medical records and it was powerful the emotions were mixed and we saw those dreadful pictures which is something that we want to change as far as the legacy as far as their legacy because they weren't just those guinea pigs and they weren't just those lab rats they were human beings so with that said yeah but you don't want to you don't you don't want to change those I mean you don't want to change the medical records do you oh no no definitely not we don't want to change that but we want to tell the story of the men that's that that that's what I'm saying they weren't just that they were more than that so that's that's that's that's very important and we have as I say if you visit the website you will see all of the things that we're trying to do and thank you for encouraging others to join us yeah please me uh I think of what Ella was all Ella was all and um the uh the Jewish Holocaust that uh I got to meet him and when I was used to live in Boston and to see the kind of work that he was doing the and I would I would hope that we would find people uh even in our own African-American community who had that kind of zeal to understand that if you don't build this legacy you're just uh you're just you you were just you know it's like what uh uh Joan Baez used to sing it's it's blowing in the wind and you and in us in us in a society such as ours you have to institutionalize it and build the legacy and of course that and I would hope that it would be coupled with it continue to couple it with what the work the bioethic center is doing because to know the the the moral to know the stories of these men that legacy is to also know the moral the the the moral moral streams that inform that legacy that is that there's certain moral streams in the American narrative where they came out of slavery or where they came out of the the national ethos that informed uh the the um your father and others they informed that legacy let me shut up we we we've got a a long story but we just can't tell it all today let me close by asking uh our uh co-moderators to have a closing remark let's start with um uh Lindsay and Taylor and then Dr. Bendell closing remarks about this another powerful session miss glenn closing okay um I just want to thank everybody for attending because starting these conversations are extremely important and the only way we can make changes by having these conversations and having an open floor for everyone to tell their story and how black history affects them so thank you so much everybody and thank you let's go yes um I want to echo Lindsay's thoughts and also just um say thank you for the opportunity to be listening and learning from all of you today it was a great presentation thank you my colleague Dr. Bendell well let me thank um both uh Mrs. Head and Dr. Earl for being with us and sharing their uh thoughts uh their minds their hearts uh and their stories today uh that to me really showed that if we work together to learn not just the ideas but to really hear the stories of of your father mrs. head of the men uh and remember our humanity in all of ourselves that in Dr. Earl's words we can not just will the good but together we can do the good and be beneficence and move forward together to realize our potential as brothers and sisters all together thank you so much for your graciousness and your generosity and a truly memorable inspiring and world-changing presentation today we're most grateful thank you then we quickly close by thanking my colleague Dr. Bob Krug and Dr. Lackland Farrell and of course Dr. Hodge for putting this together and of course Dr. Bendell we will be here this time again next week with another powerful story we're going to talk about political disparities and please join us and again let me thank our our presenters let me thank you for sharing and let me close this by saying that we've had another good session and we look forward to many many many more and thank all of you for participating and I'm going to sign off at the pleasure of the chair thanks again thank you