Families sue US over Black babies who died in 1960s vaccine test

The families of two Black infants who died in 1967 after secretly being administered an experimental vaccine are suing the United States government for damages, their lawyers announced Thursday.

Ross Otto Hambrick and Victor Marcellus King, aged two and four months respectively, were used to test an early vaccine against respiratory syncytial virus (RSV). Lawyers stated in a press release that tissue samples harvested from the babies' autopsies decades later informed the development of RSV vaccines approved in 2023, which are now generating billions in revenue.

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The complaint alleges that tissue samples harvested from their autopsies decades later informed the development of RSV vaccines approved” by the federal regulators in 2023, and are “now generating billions in revenue.

The lawsuit alleges that the infants were chosen without their parents' knowledge or consent to test a "dangerous, highly concentrated experimental vaccine known as 'Lot 100.'" Both boys died in January 1967. The National Institutes of Health (NIH) sponsored the experimental RSV vaccine trial in 1965 and 1966.

Filed under the Federal Tort Claims Act, the complaint asserts that the US government, through the NIH, selected "the most vulnerable children it could find, Black infants from low-income families." The article notes the historical context of the US conducting secret medical experiments on Black people, referencing President Bill Clinton's 1997 apology for the Tuskegee Syphilis Study.

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The complaint, brought under the Federal Tort Claims Act, alleges that the United States government, through the NIH, selected the most vulnerable children it could find, Black infants from low-income families.