A nine-month-long BBC investigation has revealed that the city of New York has been forcing HIV positive children under its supervision to be used as human guinea pigs in tests for experimental HIV drug trials, in some cases against their will. All of the children in the program are under the legal guidance of the city’s child welfare department, the Administration for Children’s Services. Most were living either in foster care or independent homes run on behalf of the local authorities, Almost all the children are believed to be African-American or Latino. One New York social worker told the BBC she had never been informed that the drugs she was administering to children were experimental and highly toxic. Jacklyn Hoerger said, “We were told that if they were vomiting, if they lost their ability to walk, if they were having diarrhea, if they were dying, then all of this was because of their HIV infection.” In fact it was the drugs that were causing many of the problems. The BBC identified pharmaceutical giant GlaxoSmithKline as one of the companies that provided drugs for the tests.