Human experiments scandal at Arkansas VA hospital unearthed

The Washington Times has an exclusive report today on a disturbing scandal at a veteran's hospital in Little Rock, Arkansas:

An investigation of research conducted at an Arkansas veterans hospital has uncovered rampant violations in its human experiments program, including missing consent forms, secret HIV testing and failure to report more than 100 deaths of subjects participating in studies.

The Department of Veterans Affairs is expected to release the findings of an internal investigation today.

The experiments on veterans at the Central Arkansas Veterans Healthcare System in Little Rock were rife with procedural violations. According to the Times:

[E]ntire consent forms were missing, signatures were missing from consent forms, HIV testing was conducted without documented consent, and research officials failed to obtain witness signatures in a study involving patients with dementia.

To give a sense of the scale: 1,400 veterans were tested in one cancer experiment. A random review of 105 files found only 20 had consent forms.

But perhaps most disturbing is that the hospital apparently attempted to cover up over 100 deaths of veterans who took part in the experiments:

Additionally, the investigation found that researchers had failed to report "serious adverse events" during the experiments, including the deaths of 105 veterans. The researchers were required to report such events, regardless of whether they were accidental or linked to the experiments, to the Internal Review Board.

The story comes over a year after the shocking scandals of poor veteran care surfaced at Walter Reed Army Medical Center in Virginia, which The Washington Post reported were only examples of a VA system that is failing the nation's 24.3 million veterans, including over 600,000 veterans of Afghanistan and Iraq:

Stories of neglect and substandard care have flooded in from soldiers, their family members, veterans, doctors and nurses working inside the system. They describe depressing living conditions for outpatients at other military bases around the country, from Fort Lewis in Washington state to Fort Dix in New Jersey.

Perhaps this is why U.S. Department of Veterans Affairs Secretary James B. Peake has issued a directive that prohibits voter registration at VA facilities?