The Coventry MP Taiwo Owatemi has called for a statutory inquiry into medical research in the 1960s on south Asian women in the city, who were given chapatis containing radioactive isotopes.
A total of 21 Indian-origin women, identified through a Coventry GP, were given the bread containing Iron-59 (an iron isotope with a gamma-beta emitter) as part of a research trial in 1969 into iron deficiency in the south Asian population.
After consuming the bread, the women were taken to the Atomic Energy Research Establishment at Harwell in Oxfordshire where their radiation levels were measured as a way of judging how much iron had been absorbed.
The women are assumed to have been recent immigrants with limited English and the few who were identified in the 1990s, when the trial first came to light, said they did not give informed consent and were not aware of the use of radioactive isotopes.
Owatemi said: “My foremost concern is for the women and the families of those who were experimented on in this study. I know that there is deep worry among the south Asian community here in Coventry because of this.
“I am deeply disturbed that a community here in Coventry was targeted for research without them being able to give informed consent.”
Her call for an inquiry was backed by Zarah Sultana, the MP for Coventry South, who said: “I am shocked that this study was allowed to happen in the way that it did, and that in spite of it having been exposed decades ago, the South Asian community in Coventry has still not had a full explanation of what happened.
“I therefore support calls for a statutory inquiry into this study and the way these women were treated, ensuring that the community gets answers to what happened.”
The study, conducted by Prof Peter Elwood from Cardiff University and funded by the Medical Research Council (MRC), was first investigated in a 1995 Channel 4 documentary, Deadly Experiments, which led to an inquiry by the MRC in 1998. This concluded that the health risks were “very low”, and the level of radiation participants were exposed to equated to “about an additional three months of natural background radiation [or] single chest X-ray taken at that time”.
However, the inquiry found that although “a serious attempt was made to inform study participants effectively … it is possible that, despite the best intentions of the research team, full details of the study were not grasped by the women involved”.
The inquiry found that participants’ children were often asked by the research team to interpret and “it is possible that a word did not exist for ‘radiation’ in any of” the languages and dialects spoken by the women.
The report said “none of the original research subjects came forward [for the inquiry], despite numerous avenues being pursued”, and the health visitor who was used as an interpreter could not be located.
It concluded: “It would not be acceptable to conduct such research nowadays without proper interpretation and written materials in the participants’ own language.”
Owatemi said she was working with academics at the University of Warwick who were trying to find the women involved in the research. A spokesperson from the team said: “Our plan is to try to identify the women and work with them to advise them about what happened and give them a voice. But we’re trying to design a research methodology to find them in a way that wouldn’t cause panic in the community.
“Academic practices are so different now and they are constantly being updated but unfortunately for these 21 women, it was a case that the consent probably wasn’t informed.”
Owatemi said she was appalled there were no follow-up morbidity studies on the participants to check for any long-term health effects and said the women should be identified so “they can share their stories, receive any support needed and so that lessons are learned”.
She said: “I will be calling for a debate on this as soon as possible after parliament returns in September followed by a full statutory inquiry into how this was allowed to happen.”
A spokesperson for the MRC said the organisation understood there were renewed concerns about the research and it would be contacting Owatemi to answer any questions.
“The [1998] report did recognise that research practice, ethics and regulation had moved on significantly since the studies were originally undertaken and made a series of recommendations,” the spokesperson said. “The inquiry directly resulted in new guidance, and additional improvements have been made since then.
“It is also important to note that work by the MRC, and across the sector, has and continues to strengthen approaches to public and patient involvement, ethics and regulation over the 25 years since the report was published. MRC remains committed to the highest standards of integrity in the way individuals are involved in research.”
Cardiff University declined to comment.
