system
Given the following post, respond as if you're commenting on Reddit:
human
ELI5: Why are untested medical treatments not allowed to be used when no known treatments work and the patient is sure to die?

If a patient is suffering from an illness, all available treatments have failed, and death is imminent, why can't the patient consent to be treated with untested treatments or drugs that may save them?  Are there laws against this, and if so, why?
gpt
Terminal patients are allowed to take part in clinical trials using experimental medication. The catch is that these trials need half the patients to be secretly given placebos so there is a control group to compare against. Some states have passed "right to try laws" which allow terminal patients to have access to placebo free experimental medication. The problem is that the lack of placebos makes it much harder for doctors to develop effective therapies, so these laws probably cause more harm in the long run.