USC Annenberg Media reports:

Near the end of 2017, the United States Navy filed a notice of intent to begin purchasing human cadavers from the University of Southern California. The purpose: Use dead bodies in trauma surgery training for the Israeli Defense Forces.

Since that notice, the Navy has paid USC more than $860,000 for at least 89 “fresh cadaver bodies,” 32 of which were used specifically for IDF training at Los Angeles General Medical Center.

One contract is still ongoing. The Navy has already paid USC over half a million dollars, but the most recent contract allows for an additional $225,000 worth of cadavers to be purchased at the Navy’s discretion, which would bring USC’s total earned for the last seven years to nearly $1.1 million.

While the three contracts in question make up less than 1% of USC’s 367 contracts with the Navy, Annenberg Media was unable to locate any other U.S. university that had similar contracts involving the IDF. (See the other contracts here and here.)

Medical professionals are also raising questions about whether families of the dead have any idea that their loved ones might be used to train soldiers. USC says it operates the programs in accordance with regulations.

The Navy Trauma Training Center oversees the courses at L.A. General. In addition to courses with an established 30-day curriculum for Navy physicians, nurses and corpsmen preparing for deployment, the NTTC trains IDF surgical teams for 96 hours of surgical technician time per course.

Navy and IDF medics rotate through the Fresh Tissue Dissection Lab, jointly funded by Los Angeles County and USC, for “hands-on training on non-perfused and perfused cadaver bodies” to simulate battlefield injuries, according to an inactive 2023 contract. Perfused bodies are pumped with artificial blood to mimic “real-life” patients, which can only be done with fresh tissue.

According to a 2020 medical paper co-authored by Keck and Navy trauma surgeons, the “combat trauma surgery skills course” attended by IDF medical personnel used “fresh human cadavers.” These cadavers were provided by the L.A. County Office of Decedent Affairs, which manages cremation and burial for the county’s unclaimed bodies. Relatives might not claim a body for any number of reasons, including the cost of burial.

“Even though they’re deceased, they still deserve a level of respect and dignity and proper treatment that we would normally give to the living,” Thomas Champney, an anatomy professor at the University of Miami who researches the ethical use of body donors, said in a March interview. [Continue reading…]