BiDil: Assessing a Race-Based Pharmaceutical

"Special treatment": BiDil, Tuskegee, and the logic of race.

BiDil, a drug approved in 2005 by the FDA only for African Americans, was seen by many as almost reparations for the horrors of the Tuskegee Syphilis Study (1932-72) where treatment for black men was denied. The logic of race, however, rather than racism, links BiDil to the past many thought it was escaping.

A new physiologic race

Assessing different perspectives on the value of a pharmaceutical innovation

Numerous pharmaceutical products are launched each year for the treatment of various medical conditions. The prescriber is in a difficult position to determine which the optimal product is for a specific patient, when he has available immediate release as well as sustained action capsules and tablets, chewable tablets and liquid dosage forms. Some have activity within 15 minutes while others ta...

What's Wrong with Race-Based Medicine?: Genes, Drugs, and Health Disparities

In June 2005, the Food and Drug Administration (FDA) announced a historic decision: it approved the first pharmaceutical indicated for a specific race.1 BiDil, a combination drug that relaxes the blood vessels, was authorized to treat heart failure in self-identified black patients. BiDil had been tested in the African-American Heart Failure Trial (A-HeFT) launched in 2001.2 A-HeFT enrolled 1,0...

evidence based pharmaceutical care

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