Oral Presentations Abstracts: BIOCOLONIALISM AND INFORMED CONSENT. THE HAVASUPAI CASE

Abstract

View of Volume 66, Special Issue, September 2021

A core value in research ethics is respect for individual’s autonomy. For the researcher the way to respect this value is to guarantee informed consent to the participants. Nowadays more and more research is conducted on biological material of human origin rather than on humans. But apart from that, informed consent must be guaranteed.

The case I would like to present and comment is the Havasupai case. Havasupai are an indigenous tribe lived in Grand Canyon. Due to the high percentage of diabetes type 2 among members of the tribe, the tribe decided to take part in the research conducted by the researchers from Arizona State University. In this case were a few vague aspects, which I will present during the speech, but one thing I especially notice. In the scientific community there was a great interest in obtaining Havasupai blood samples. It was caused by the fact that Havasupai are an indigenous people and they do not start a family with people out of them tribe. Because of that their DNA is scientifically more interesting than the DNA of people out of the tribe.

That approach is called biocolonialism. In the past indigenous people were used because of the sources that they had on their lands. Now their DNA is a scientifically valuable source of information. Moreover, in literature it is said that researchers – the new (bio)colonizers – are conducting a “helicopter research”. They came up, took what they want and disappear.

In my speech I would like to analyze problems raised in Havasupai case and present what the biocolonialism means in and for research.