ELI5: Explain Like I'm 5

Harold Blauer

Harold Blauer was a person who lived in the 1930s and 1940s. He was a patient at a psychiatric hospital, where doctors were experimenting on him with a new type of medicine called mescaline. The doctors were testing to see if the medicine could help people with mental illnesses. During his treatments, Harold began to develop strange and unexpected side effects. He became very agitated and aggressive, and he even started having hallucinations. Eventually, the doctors decided to stop giving Harold the medicine, but it was too late – Harold had developed an addiction to the drug and his behavior became increasingly worse. Harold eventually died in 1953, after which it was discovered that the doctors had been using him as an unwitting human guinea pig in a dangerous experiment. Today, Harold's story serves as a reminder of the potential danger of using people in medical experiments without their permission.