Cadaver exhibits cause concern

HOT SPRINGS, Ark. (AP) — In softly lit rooms at the museum, men and women are quietly wandering about, kids in tow, bemused by the perfectly preserved human bodies and organs on display. An elderly man leans down and whispers to a boy staring at a skull in a glass case.

“See the jaw bone? See the hole in the nose?” the man says. “Every part of your body has a purpose.”

It is exactly the response curators hoped for when the Mid-America Science Museum acquired “Our Body: The Universe Within,” an exhibit featuring human cadavers.

The exhibit has become staggeringly popular, doubling the number of monthly visitors to the museum from a year ago. Similar exhibitions across the country, in Europe and in South America have also gained popularity.

But some museums can offer little more than verbal assurance that the bodies once belonged to people who willingly agreed to bequeath their skin, bones and organs for display.

Two companies — Premier Exhibitions Inc. in the United States and Gunther von Hagen’s Body Worlds in Germany — have been the primary developers and promoters of the exhibits and the main targets of criticism. Their displays have been featured as educational programs in accredited science museums as well as side attractions at Las Vegas casinos.

As a result, some states have considered legislation to ban exhibits that do not have proof of consent for use of the bodies commercially, and a bill recently introduced in Congress would outlaw the import of “plasticized cadavers,” a reference to the preservation process.

Geared to teaching children, Mid-America was careful to present the exhibit, which runs through Jan. 1, in a serious manner.

The exhibit is separated by temporary walls from the rest of the museum displays, and has a separate entrance and exit. Its overriding colors are black, deep reds and neutral tones, in contrast to the bright shiny blues, yellows and greens elsewhere in the museum. Visitors are told that the exhibit is “respectful of the mystery of the human body” and the “basic value of mankind” to understand how the body works.

A cautionary notice is posted at the entrance to the prenatal section, asking that parents accompany their children and visitors treat “these specimens with the utmost dignity and respect.”

The 20 bodies and 200 specimens at Mid-America come from people who once lived in China. The museum said it is satisfied that the bodies were obtained properly.

Premier, which brokered the exhibit, and a Baltimore company that owns the collection provided documentation that the bodies did not come from people who were tortured or imprisoned or did not give their consent, said executive director Andy Marquart.

The documentation was detailed, Marquart said, showing that a medical doctor had inspected the remains and also outlining the procurement process used by the Anatomical Sciences and Technologies Foundation in Hong Kong.

Premier came under scrutiny last spring in New York over allegations that the bodies used in another exhibit — “Bodies, The Exhibition” — were Chinese prisoners who were executed and may not have given their consent for their remains to be used in public displays.