The Immortal Life Of Henrietta Lacks By Houston Mullican

The Woman who unknowingly changed the world.
By: Houston Mullican “The immortal Life of Henrietta Lacks.” A book written by Rebecca Skloot is a book based on the personal and scientific aspect of Henrietta Lacks. Henrietta Lacks was born on August 1, 1920, in Virginia. She married her cousin Day and had 5 children. It was during her pregnancy with her last child that she developed cervical cancer. During her fight with cancer she was admitted into John Hopkins the local hospital nearby. Where she was treated for her cancer several of her tumor cells where taken for research without her consent. One of these samples was taken to George Gey who cultured these cells which eventually became known as HeLa and that make up the HeLa cell line. This

Shortly after this happened Henrietta died from the cervical cancer on October 4, 1951. It wasn’t until two decades later that Henriettas name was released to the press, and it wasn’t until even later in the 1990’s when Rebecca Skloot heard of HeLa cells and was interested why there was so little information about her. Skloot then comes into contact with Henriettas family and most importantly forms a bond with Deborah, Henrietta’s oldest daughter. This bond with Deborah was crucial to find out information of Henrietta. While researching the bond grows and Skloot realizes that Deborah just wants to learn as much as possible about her mother like she wants too (Skloot Deborah really just wants her mother’s story to be told and people to realize that there is a person behind all the

“Participation by individuals capable of giving informed consent as subjects in medical research must be voluntary” (Ethics in Medical Research and Publication 2). This was a clear violation in ethics by taking Henrietta’s cells, but at the time racism was still alive and the doctors were a lot less ethical considering all the ethical violations in the medical field happening at this time. The HeLa cell line developed from her cells was estimated at a whopping 3 billion dollars, and none goes to the family. The family is struggling to afford their own medical care while companies are still profiting off their mother. Even with all this hardship put on the family some good has come out of this malicious act such as when HeLa cells were used to test vaccines for polio saving millions or when telomerase ,an enzyme used to fix DNA, allowed scientists to test anti-cancerous drugs that would have killed normal cells (Popular Science, pars. 3-5). Henrietta Lacks is a perfect example of why this nation needs ethics. Her story not only tells us of her hardship, but of her family’s hardship too. The family has had to deal with a multitude of hardships not only by money being generated because of her mother that doesn’t go to them, but by the constant barrage of reporters other scientists. Can you imagine