In the United States the Environmental Protection Agency (EPA) announces that it will be considering guidelines to allow pesticide testing in humans. In accordance with the Food Quality Protection Act of 1996, the EPA must review 9,000 pesticides currently on the market to ensure that they meet new safety standards (Spotts 1999).

Researchers at the National Institutes of Mental Health (NIMH) and elsewhere pay healthy subjects $100 to take a hallucinogenic drug called ketamine. Ketamine is ordinarily used as an animal tranquilizer, but it has also gained notoriety as a street drug. Because of the alleged use of ketamine for date rape, several states have made possession of it a felony. The purpose of the NIMH studies is to induce a temporary psychotic state. Researchers argue that the studies may offer new insights into the treatment of schizophrenia (Kong 1998).