I just stumbled across a photo gallery depicting images of "the boy in the bubble," David Vetter. In the 70s, there was a lot of media attention on David, who was born with an immune system deficiency disease that made it impossible for his body to handle germs. Not wanting to lose their son, his parents opted to keep him in a plastic sterile environment.
David became a science experiment of sorts. No one was sure of the effects of long-term confinement, and doctors were able to study his germ-free blood. NASA actually made him a suit so that he could venture into the outside world, but David is reported to have been extremely terrified that germs would breach his protective suit.
David passed away at age 12 after he received a contaminated blood marrow transfusion that ended up creating hundreds of cancerous tumors all over his body.
David is somewhat similar to Frankenstein's creature. They were both isolated from society, forced to make do with their unhappy existences. They could both watch the outside world and long to join the people they saw, but were powerless to fully integrate themselves. And then of course there is the question of whether or not it was ethical to keep David in such conditions, and how far science should go. To quote the end of the 2nd linked article, "In our rush to prolong life, are we creating states so unnatural that they beg the question of what it means to be human?"
I think the parallels you drew between Frankenstein and the "boy in the bubble" say a lot about how science restricts human rights. The boy in the bubble is entirely dependent on outside sources to live and Frankenstein is dependent on the acceptance of others to acclimate to society. The bubble and Frankenstein's skin are both forms of isolation, restricting the rights of both the boy and Frankenstein's minds.
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