Prisoner Interrogations

In the July 7 issue it was reported that APA had endorsed a policy that psychiatrists should not participate directly in interrogations of prisoners. This policy statement was spirited by the abuse of medical ethics by certain physicians who had had a hand in the interrogation of Afghan and Iraqi prisoners in the Guantanamo and Abu Ghraib prisons.

Since psychiatrists are much more likely to be invited or ordered (if in the military) to consult indirectly with interrogators, it is a stain on our profession to imply that any participation in interrogation other than direct participation is within our profession's ethical standards. Giving advice to military or correctional interrogators on how to influence or motivate the disclosure of intelligence or confessions is tantamount to participation in torture. As physicians, we cannot excuse consultations by statements such as “I didn't know what was going on” or “I was just following orders.”

Individual values and responsibility of physicians are shaped by their medical organizations as well as by residency programs that implicitly influence trainees to view patients as little more than the abstract sums of their diagnoses, thereby minimizing their uniqueness as human beings, as noted by S.H. Miles in the book Oath Betrayed (Random House, 2006).

I expect more of APA and urge its governing officials to pronounce any and all participation in interrogations as unethical.