Ethical Issues In Honeybee Democracy And The Immortal Life Of Henrietta Lacks

Ethics throughout science are very controversial as they are the model of distinguishing between right and wrong throughout all aspects of research. Throughout Honeybee Democracy and The Immortal Life of Henrietta Lacks we are given an insider’s perspective to the ethics, or the lack there of, regarding the ongoing research and the researchers conducting it. Although the books cover very different subject matter, there are divisions of their research and within their individual ethics that are almost indistinguishable.
One of the most highly debatable and common questions of ethics stems from the idea of whether it is acceptable to sacrifice lives for science. For the bees under the careful watch of Tom Seeley we know that “choosing the right

For the doctors treating her, having her life in their hands was nothing new; they were used to complete control. This is precisely where the ethical debate regarding Henrietta’s matter of life of death comes into play. For the medical and scientific worlds her cells may have held, “A glimpse of immorality,” (Skloot 143) but for her family they were pieces of their beloved mother. For some of the family members the lack of consent granted by Henrietta turned their mother’s cells into symbols of aggression and confusion. On the contrary, some of the family was grateful for all of the things Henrietta was able to contribute, “I know she had something rare, cause she been dead a pretty good while, but her cells still living, and that’s amazing” (Skloot 158). Being that the members of the Lack’s family had limited resources and a limited education, not only did they remain in the dark for some time, they were also clueless when it came to biology and HeLa

Considering that there is no way Seeley can receive justification from his research subjects, his research is never questioned or ridiculed by those partaking, but in a quotation from a previous paragraph we see that it wasn’t easy for him to kill the bees, even if it was for science. On the contrary, the same thing cannot be said for the staff at John Hopkin’s Hospital, “Many scientists believed that since patients were treated for free in the public wards, it was fair to use them as research subjects as a form of payment” (Skloot 55). Although at this time there was no Nuremberg Code of Ethics, it is obvious that the doctors knew they were harming the patients they were researching. One doctor even questioned, “If the whole profession is doing it, how can you call it unprofessional conduct?” (Skloot 173). This argument is contradicted, however as earlier on throughout this section there were doctors resigning and refusing to inject patients. When one of the doctors was prompted to explain why he didn’t care to inject himself with the solution he responded, “Let’s face it, there are relatively few skilled cancer researchers, and it seemed stupid to take even the little risk” (Skloot 173). Thankfully both of the doctors who were guilty of unprofessional conduct in their practice had their medical licenses suspended. Tom Seeley