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Henrietta Lacks (August 18, 1920, to October 4, 1951) was a poor Southern African-American tobacco farmer whose cancerous cervical tumor was the source of cells George Otto Gey at Johns Hopkins in Baltimore, Maryland, cultured. These "immortal" cells remain "alive," 60 years after her death, revolutionizing medical research.

In her 2010 book, The Immortal Life of Henrietta Lacks, Rebecca Skloot documents the histories of both the cell line-called the HeLa cell line after the first two letters of her first and last names to protect her identity-and the Lacks family. Henrietta's husband, David Lacks, was told little following her death. Suspicions fueled by racial issues prevalent in the South at the time were compounded by issues of class and education. Members of the Lacks family were kept in the dark about the existence of the tissue line, and when its existence was revealed in a 1976 Rolling Stone article by Michael Rogers, family members were confused about how Henrietta's cells could have been taken without consent and how they could still be alive 25 years after her death. Skloot's book takes the reader on an incredible journey from the "colored" ward of Johns Hopkins Hospital in the 1950s to the research laboratories with freezers full of HeLa cells, to Henrietta's small, dying town of Clover, Virginia, to east Baltimore, where Henrietta's children and grandchildren live.

The basic facts about the story of Henrietta Lacks are well documented. On February 1, 1951, Ms. Lacks visited Johns Hopkins because of a painful "knot" in her cervix and bloody vaginal discharge. After a biopsy, she was diagnosed with cervical cancer. The appearance of the tumor was unlike anything the examining gynecologist, Dr. Howard Jones, had seen. Prior to the treatment for the carcinoma, cells from the tumor were removed for research purposes without her knowledge or permission, which was standard procedure at that time. During her second visit eight days later, Dr. George Otto Gey obtained another sample of her tumor. These cells would eventually become the HeLa immortal cell line. In significant pain and without improvement, Lacks returned to Johns Hopkins Hospital on August 8 demanding admission and remained there until her death on October 4 at the age of 31. A subsequent partial autopsy showed that the cancer had metastasized throughout her body.

Gey "discovered that [Henrietta's] cells did something they had never seen before: They could be kept alive and grow." (p. 94) Cells obtained previously from other sources would survive for only a few days. Some cells in Lacks' tissue sample behaved differently than others. Gey was able to isolate one specific cell, multiply it and start the HeLa cell line. As the first human cells that could be grown in a lab and were "immortal" (did not die after a few cell divisions), they could then be used for many experiments. This represented an enormous boon to medical and biological research. It is estimated that total weight of all the HeLa cells ever grown exceeds 50 million metric tons.

The HeLa cells were vital for developing the polio vaccine and uncovering secrets of cancer, viruses and radiation effects. These cells led to improvements in in vitro fertilization, cloning, and gene mapping. Demand for the HeLa cells quickly grew. A special unit was established in Tuskegee Institute, Tuskeegee, Alabama, where African-American scientists helped grow the HeLa cells and also evaluated Dr. Jonas Salks's polio vaccine. "Black scientists and technicians, many of them women, used cells from a black woman to help save the lives of millions of Americans, most of them white. And they did so on the same campus-and at the very same time-that state officials were conducting the infamous Tuskegee syphilis study." (p. 97)

In 1932, 600 African-Americans, 399 with syphilis and 201 without, were enrolled in a study to investigate the natural course of syphilis. In 1947 penicillin was discovered as the drug of choice for syphilis, but the study patients were denied it. This federal government-sponsored study was projected to last six months, however, it continued for 40 years and was only stopped in 1972 after public outcry. After a $10 million settlement, President Clinton in 1997 apologized on behalf of the nation.

Scientists worldwide have used Henrietta's cells for research in cancer, AIDS, the effects of radiation and toxic substances, gene mapping, and countless other scientific pursuits. HeLa cells have been used to test human sensitivity to tape, glue, cosmetics, and many other products. There are almost 11,000 patents involving HeLa cells.

Henrietta's family did not learn of her "immortality" until more than 25 years after her death, when scientists investigating HeLa began using specimens from her husband and children without informed consent. Her family also did not see any profits from the multimillion-dollar industry that sells human biological materials.

Unresolved Issues: Tissue Rights

There are two key issues to deal with regarding tissue rights: consent and money. Up to now tissue research does not legally require informed consent. Storing blood and tissues is a routine procedure with no legal requirement for consent. It is estimated that in 1999 in the United States alone, there were more than 307 million tissue samples from more than 178 million people, and it is estimated that this number increases by 20 million samples each year. The unanswered question is determining the "ownership" of these biological products and cells. Once removed from a patient, does he have "ownership" of the tissue/cells and other biological materials?

However, it is clear to me that depriving the Lacks family of any financial gain from HeLa cells is not right. Deborah, Henrietta's daughter who provided most of the information for the book under review, pointedly asked: Had scientists cloned her mother? Had they killed her to harvest her cells? And if her mother was so important to medicine, why could her children not afford health insurance? The author describes Deborah as the soul of the book. Her spirit, her laughter, her pain, her determination and her unbelievable strength inspired the author to work more than 10 years to research and write the book.

In conclusion, I found the book very interesting, absorbing, and informative. Through this book the stories of modern medicine, the racial politics of medicine, bioethics, and race relations in United States are presented thoughtfully, and the Lacks family's painful story is presented with grace. The author, a young white Jewish female, had to struggle for a long time to win the family's confidence. Her 10-year effort has paid rich dividends, and to the author's credit she has established a scholarship fund for the descendants of Henrietta Lacks.

In May 2010, HBO announced that Oprah Winfrey and Alan Ball would develop a film project based on Skloot's book.

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Henrietta Lacks (August 18, 1920, to October 4, 1951) was a poor Southern African-American tobacco farmer whose cancerous cervical tumor was the source of cells George Otto Gey at Johns Hopkins in Baltimore, Maryland, cultured. These "immortal" cells remain "alive," 60 years after her death, revolutionizing medical research.

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"One afternoon, as Henrietta lay on the couch, she lifted her shirt to show Margaret and Sadie what the treatments had done to her. Sadie Gasped: The skin from Henrietta's breast to her pelvis was charred a deep black from the radiation. The rest of her body was its natural shade- more the color fawn than coal." (48)

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Cause of death was Uremia which is a toxin built up in the blood that usually is emptied by urinating but Henritta had a baseball sized tumor blocking her from going to the bathroom.

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Only some hospitals at the time would treat African Americans and if they did they would put them in the colored ward where often they would be multiple people per room very close together which can lead to diseases spreading. Whites thought that African Americans carried all types of diseases so this close proximity of germs didn't help the rumor because they all kept getting sick.

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In this home she was raised, and she also gave birth to all of her kids on the hallway floor as well as raised them there.

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History of Cancer Screening and Early Detection: 20th Century to Present

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Screening refers to tests and exams used to find a disease, such as cancer, in people who do not have any symptoms. Learn about the history of cancer screening and early detection here.

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Did Doctors Need Consent for Cell Research?

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Did Doctors Need Consent for Cell Research?

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Doctors in the 1960's, didn't need to ask a patient's consent to take cells from their body without their knowledge for research which is how Henritta's cells fell into Dr.Gey's (pronounced Guy) hands.

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Informed Consent: I. History of Informed Consent

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I. HISTORY OF INFORMED CONSENTInformed consent is not an ancient concept with a rich medical tradition. The term informed consent first appeared in 1957, and serious discussion of the concept began only around 1972. Source for information on Informed Consent: I. History of Informed Consent: Encyclopedia of Bioethics dictionary.

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According to some sources, doctors in the 60s were trying to make cells immortal because they thought that human cells would keep dividing forever if given the right conditions. They wanted to use these cells for medical research and testing.

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In 1612, the streets of Paris were alive with a tantalising rumour - that a man had achieved immortality.

His name was Nicholas Flamel, and though he had been born in France nearly 300 years earlier, he was credited with authoring a book about alchemy, published that year. In it, he claimed to have successfully made the philosopher's stone, a mythical object which allows its owner to turn base metals to gold and produce the elixir of life.

As the legend of Flamel's immortality spread, people began to report seeing him out and about. Even Isaac Newton, widely regarded as one of the most brilliant minds who ever lived, believed the tales. He took the book extremely seriously, and devoted a large part of his professional career to studying its contents.

Alas, it wasn't true. The real Flamel was no alchemist - he had worked as a scribe, and died in 1418 at the respectable age of 88. The book had been written by someone else.

The quest for immortality took another blow in 1961, this time in a modern laboratory in Philadelphia.
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For decades, scientists had thought that the roughly 37.2 trillion cells that make up our bodies would keep dividing - and thus replenishing themselves - forever, if only they were given the chance.

Then a young American scientist, Leonard Hayflick, made a discovery which shocked the world. It turns out ordinary human cells can only divide between 40 and 60 times before they undergo a violent, pre-determined death. This strict cut-off is known as the " Hayflick limit ", and it has two important consequences.

Firstly, our current lifespans might not just be constrained by the way we live our lives - our diets, and so on. Instead, it's possible that there are built-in limits to how old it's possible to get. In fact, if you multiply the number of cells in the human body by the average time it takes for cells to reach the Hayflick limit, you end up with 120 years. The oldest person who has ever lived, Jeanne Calment, made it to 122 years and 164 days - uncannily close.

Secondly, it's difficult to find cells that scientists can grow in the laboratory - an essential step in the production of many drugs and vaccines. Because cells are mortal individually, if you grow them in a petri dish, sooner or later they will stop dividing and die.

This is the story of the cells that helped to overcome this obstacle, and their controversial origins at a clinic in Sweden. Why are they so special? And how can we justify continuing to use them given the way they were obtained?
A hidden crisis
Before Hayflick's discovery, scientists had got around the division limit by continually replenishing their cell supplies with fresh ones from new animals, or using cancerous cells - since cancer doesn't play by the same rules as healthy tissue, and will keep growing indefinitely. But scientists were urgently in need of another way.

In the 1960s, the polio vaccine used in the United States had been hit by calamity.

Some vaccines are made by growing viral particles in cells, and then killing or weakening them so that they can't cause disease. These inactivated particles become the active ingredient - the part that teaches the immune system what to look out for.

For decades, the polio vaccine had been made in cells taken from monkey kidneys, some of which - it was later discovered - were infected with a virus, simian virus 40 (SV40). Though today vaccines are extensively filtered, and don't contain any material from the cells they're grown in, between 1955 and 1963, it's been estimated that up to 30 million people were infected in the United States alone.

The contamination is thought to have occurred because the cells were usually grown fresh from monkeys - as opposed to from a stock of laboratory cells - and SV40 is a common infection in the most widely used species, the rhesus macaque.

Whether the introduction of the virus had any medical consequences is still under question - as is the possibility that it is now spreading to people who were never vaccinated. In the laboratory, the virus has been shown to be carcinogenic, and a possible link between the virus and several types of cancer, from brain cancer to lymphoma, has been investigated, but there isn't yet definitive evidence either way.

Nevertheless, it suddenly became necessary to find an alternative supply of cells.
An anonymous woman
Then in 1962, Hayflick made another discovery. "Without it, you and I might not even be alive," says Stuart Jay Olshansky, an expert in biodemography and gerontology at the University of Illinois, Chicago.

It began when a nameless woman who was three months pregnant had a legal abortion in Sweden. As the author Meredith Wadman wrote in her book, The Vaccine Race: Science, Politics and the Human Costs of Defeating Disease, the foetus wasn't incinerated, buried or thrown away - instead it was wrapped in sterile green cloth and sent to the Karolinska Institute in northwest Stockholm.

At the time, Hayflick was sourcing the cells he used for his research from this institution. In his laboratory at the Wistar Institute in Philadelphia, he managed to incubate some of the tissue in several glass bottles at 37C (98F). He added an enzyme to break down the protein that bound the cells together, as well as "growth medium", a solution which contained the nutrients they needed to divide. After a few days, he was left with a continuous sheet of cells.

One of these cells eventually turned into the cell line "WI-38", which stands for Wistar Institute foetus 38.

Over the ensuing years, frozen vials of the cells were flown to hundreds of laboratories across the world, WI-38 is now one of the oldest and most widely available cell lines on the planet. As Hayflick has noted previously - although perhaps rather insensitively - as early as 1984, WI-38 had become "the first cultured normal human cell population to ever reach voting age". Today the cells are routinely used to make vaccines against polio, measles, mumps, rubella, varicella zoster (chicken pox), herpes zoster, adenovirus, rabies and Hepatitis A.

Why are the cells so special? And how can we justify continuing to use them?
An unlimited supply of cells
Soon after Hayflick discovered that cells are mortal, he realised that if you siphon some off each time they divide and freeze them, a single source can theoretically provide an almost unlimited supply - around 10,000,000,000,000,000,000,000 (10 sextillion) in total.

And though WI-38 cells are mortal, because the cells had divided relatively few times when they were collected, they can be grown for longer before they reach the Hayflick limit. Most WI-38 cells have 50 divisions left, which each take 24 hours to complete, so they can be grown continuously for 50 days before you need to start again.

Another reason WI-38 has become so ubiquitous is that a quirk of the American legal system at the time of its discovery: it wasn't possible to patent living things. This means their use was never restricted, and scientists around the world were able to share them freely with colleagues.

Though there are hundreds of cell lines available in the United States, WI-38 makes up the majority of the cells used, together with just one other.

"MRC-5" cells, named after the initials of the Medical Research Council where they were collected, were obtained from the lungs of another three-month-old foetus. This time the abortion happened in England in 1966 for "psychiatric reasons".

WI-38 was fundamental for the development of vaccines against polio, measles, mumps, rubella, varicella zoster (chicken pox), herpes zoster, adenovirus, rabies and Hepatitis A, as well as in the production of many early vaccines. Today it's still used to make the rubella vaccine - part of Merck's measles, mumps and rubella ( MMR) jab - and Teva's adenovirus vaccine for the US military.

Finally, foetuses are thought to be the "cleanest" possible source of cells, since they are less likely to have picked up any viruses from the outside world which might contaminate vaccines or confound the results of experiments.

Back in 2017, Hayflick asked Olshansky to quantify exactly how many lives the cells had spared until that point. By comparing the global prevalence of certain infectious diseases in the 1960s, when the cell line was discovered, with the prevalence of infectious diseases then, he calculated that vaccines made with WI-38 may have prevented around 4.5 billion infections. In total, the cells are likely to have spared 10.3 million lives.

"Not everybody dies from these diseases. But if you survive, you might survive disabled," says Olshansky. "My wife and I, we have a very close friend of ours who is suffering from the consequences of a polio exposure as a child today."

Though there hasn't been a single case of polio in the United States since 1979, a significant number of people are still thought to be living with the after-effects. This includes potentially hundreds of thousands with " post-polio syndrome", in which muscles slowly weaken and shrink. One man, 74-year-old Paul Alexander, is still trapped in an iron lung. He was paralysed by the virus in 1952 at the age of six.

There has been some controversy surrounding the origins of the cell line, however.

Apart from the fact that some people feel uncomfortable about its links to abortion, the woman whose foetus the cells came from, who Wadman has named "Mrs X", did not consent to its use. In fact, she didn't even know about it until years later, when she was contacted by someone from the Karolinska Institute who was hoping for a more detailed medical history.

The incident is unlikely to happen again today, because human tissue is regulated in the United States. Any material collected is subject to the Common Rule - a set of ethical standards introduced in 1981, which researchers must comply with in order to receive federal funding. Chief among them is the requirement for informed consent.

However, the rule doesn't apply retrospectively, and there are many examples of tissue which was effectively stolen and continues to be used to this day.

The issue was first brought to the public attention by the 2010 book, The Immortal Life of Henrietta Lacks, about an African-American woman of the same name who unknowingly had cells taken from a cervical tumour and turned into the popular cell line HeLa in 1951. So far, the cells have contributed to over 70,000 studies, and led to the discovery that the majority of cervical cancers are caused by the HPV virus. However, while Lacks' descendents are generally proud of what her cells have achieved, some have been critical that others have profited from them, when her own family has not. ( Learn more about the immortal cells of Henrietta Lacks.)
Genetic insight
These ethical transgressions have become even more problematic with the advent of affordable genetic sequencing. Human cell lines contain human DNA - and WI-38 will share 50% of its DNA with the foetus' mother. In this light, the cell line is considered by some as potentially representing a privacy risk.

A person's genetic sequence can provide insights into their familial risk of disease, ancestry, intelligence, and potential lifespan. In fact, even in cases where informed consent is obtained, there is still some debate about the ethics of using human tissue - because genetic material is familial by nature, and this decision could potentially affect many other relatives other than the one who provided it.

One way to deal with these concerns is to involve the family in decisions about when and how their genetic information is used. For the HeLa cell line, there have been some efforts to achieve this. Back in 2013, the National Institutes of Health came to an understanding with Lacks' relatives, and set up a panel with three family members to review requests to access the full genome. By then, a German team had already published the full sequence on the internet.

Despite these concerns, the benefits of using the cells are widely thought to vastly outweigh them, and many religious organisations which are otherwise anti-abortion have publicly announced their support for the use of vaccines manufactured this way when no other alternatives exist, including the Catholic Church, although it did express a need for alternative sources of vaccines.

The connection between the chilling origins of many cell lines and the benefits they provide is perhaps most striking in the development of the rubella vaccine. Though it's produced in WI-38 cells to this day, its early development relied heavily on cells taken from several different aborted foetuses - many of which had been aborted for the very reason that their mother was infected with the virus.

Rubella can cause a number of serious consequences during pregnancy, such as stillbirth and miscarriage. If a woman is infected early on, she has a 90% chance of passing the virus to her unborn child, where it can lead to "congenital rubella syndrome" and a constellation of health problems, from brain damage to hearing loss.

"You have to think, well what about the ethical consequences of not using the cell line?" says Olshansky. "Just keep in mind that they are a critical link in the chain, in the development of viral vaccines."

Four centuries on from the publication of Flamel's book, and his fans might be disappointed to hear that no one has made it to 300, let alone discovered the secret to living forever. But though the Hayflick limit currently seems like a formidable barrier for people, it's no longer such a problem for scientists. Ironically, their efforts to overcome it in cells have arguably helped to keep more of us alive than research into immortality ever has.
This article has been amended to clarify that WI-38 is one of the oldest cell lines in use, rather than the oldest, and which vaccines it is used to produce today.
--
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The controversial cells that saved 10 million lives

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In 1612, the streets of Paris were alive with a tantalising rumour - that a man had achieved immortality. His name was Nicholas Flamel, and though he had been born in France nearly 300 years earlier, he was credited with authoring a book about alchemy, published that year.

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"George (George Gey, the scientist who wanted to grow immortal cells) told me he leaned over Henrietta's bed and said, 'Your cells will make you immortal.' He told Henrietta her cells would save the lives of countless people, and she smiled. She told him she was glad her pain would come to some good for someone." (66) This was right before Henrietta passed. This conversation between Gey and Henrietta is supposably the only time he had talked to her and also the last time due to her passing later that night.

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The immortal cells of Henrietta Lacks - Robin Bulleri

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An amazing live video of HeLa cells dividing. This video is actually mind blowing once you think about how its happening right now billions and billions of times in your body.

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The Scientist who saw HeLa Cells divide for the first time

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The Scientist who saw HeLa Cells divide for the first time

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Health Disparities in the Black Community: Past & Present

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Health Disparities in the Black Community: Past & Present

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This video is amazing and also talks about the HeLa cells and how it was unfair they were taken from her. She talks about the problems in the past with healthcare for the black community and how the problems back then are some of the same problems that are still happening today.

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HeLa Cells are sold for about $200- $10,000 a vial. This means that HeLa Cells are a multibillion-dollar company that the family of who they came from hasn't been able to get any money from. Not even money, one of Henritta's children is $100,000 in debt after a bypass surgery and they don't get any health insurance, any money, or any recognition.

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/ CBS

The gift of life is surely the greatest gift of all. So how could the story of a remarkable woman who gave that gift over and over again have been overlooked for so long? Here's Jim Axelrod now to set the record straight:

Somewhere in the humble family cemetery off a country road in the town of Clover in southern Virginia, a woman who died nearly 60 years ago lies in an unmarked grave.
It is a shame, because the world should know her name: Henrietta Lacks.

She was a poor, African-American tobacco farmer, a mother of five children, who died of cervical cancer when she was 31.

She was also, says Rebecca Skloot, one of the most important unknown figures in medicine, "and she had no idea."

Skloot, a professor at the University of Memphis, devoted 10 years to telling her story, writing the current bestseller, "The Immortal Life of Henrietta Lacks."

The story starts near the end of Henrietta's life: in 1950 the great-granddaughter of slaves was being treated for cervical cancer at Johns Hopkins Hospital in Baltimore.

Without her knowing, and unrelated to her treatment, doctors took some of her cells for research.

"She happened to walk into Hopkins at a time when scientists were trying to grow human cells in culture and were taking cells from anybody they could," said Skloot.

By the late 1940s scientists were on the brink of a golden age of medicine, Jonas Salk was racing to develop the polio vaccine, but his work - and that of countless others - was hampered because they lacked a critical tool: human cells for testing.

Scientists had been trying for years to keep human cells alive in the lab, but none of them lasted very long, until Henrietta Lacks showed up at Hopkins.

"With her under anesthesia, they just took this small piece of her tumor, without her knowing, and they put it in a dish and sent it down the hall to George Guy, who was the head of tissue culture research at Hopkins," said Skloot. "He had been trying to grow human cells for decades, and it had never worked. And hers just took off."

"Took off" doesn't begin to describe it. For the first time in history, human cells could be grown and infinitely replicated, outside the body.

Henrietta Lacks died in October 1951, just 8 months after seeking help at Hopkins. But her cells lived on, multiplying by the billions.

Why? What was there specific to Henrietta Lacks' cells?

"We know, mechanically, that the cells stay alive because they have this enzyme in them that rebuilds the ends of their chromosomes, so the cells just never get old, they don't die," Skloot said. "But why her cells did that when all the other cells didn't is still a little bit of a mystery."

To this day, "HeLa" cells - named by combining the first two letters of "Henrietta" and "Lacks" - are a cornerstone of modern medicine.

"To tick off all the way HeLa cells have been used, we would be sitting here for weeks," Skloot told Axelrod. "Hundreds and thousands of studies. They were used to help test the polio vaccine so that it could be approved for use in people. They went up in the first space missions to see what would happen to human cells in zero gravity. Hers were the first cells ever cloned, some of the first genes ever mapped. They've been used to create some of our basic cancer drugs, like tomaxiphin.

"I mean, the range of things that HeLa cells has been used for is, kind of, incomprehensible."

"It sounds like it's hard to imagine science in the last half-century without Hela cells," said Axelrod.

"Oh yeah! Scientists I've talked to say you cannot overestimate how important HeLa cells have been."

Yet no one in the Lacks family had been informed by Johns Hopkins of the existence of their mother's cells, until a researcher called in the early 1970s wanting to test the family.

"Henrietta's husband basically got a phone call one day," Skloot said, "and the way he understood it was, 'We've got your wife, she's alive in a laboratory, we've been doing research on her for the last 25 years.' The only cell he'd ever heard of was the kind in a prison, and he literally thought, 'Okay, so, they have her in a cell? They have part of her in a cell?'"

The news left the Lacks family confused . . . and scared.

"When you look at this in the context of the family story, you know, at 25 years after her death, not only were her cells still alive, but there were enough of them that if you could pile them all on a scale, they'd weigh 50 million metric tons," Skloot said. "That's 150 Empire State Buildings. You know, it's just inconceivable that that could even be true, and it was."

"I almost feel raped, like the family feels raped," one Lacks family member told Axelrod. "You know, they did it, and nobody told it."

"For the family, Johns Hopkins is absolutely the bad guy,' Skloot said.

"Johns Hopkins needs to do a better job of communicating with the family and recognizing it," said Dr. Daniel Ford, a vice-dean at Johns Hopkins School of Medicine.

Using Henrietta's cells for research, he maintains, was standard practice for the time.

"I think if we go back to that time and compare it to now, there was probably more of a focus on the science and discovery, with less consideration of what it meant to that individual that was going to be part of the scientific process whether they knew it or not," said Dr. Ford.

The hospital is working on acknowledging the Lacks family, but it's a tricky situation.

"The reason why is although the Henrietta Lacks case is the one that we're talking about and has the highest profile, that is not the only patient that has contributed to the research agenda of Johns Hopkins or the nation," said Dr. Ford. "So one of the issues is talking about precedent and what does that mean?"

What that means, among other things, is money. And while Hopkins claims it never sold HeLa cells, the same can't be said for medical supply companies.

"Is there any way to calculate how much money has been made off of Henrietta Lacks' cells?" Axelrod asked.

"No. They were the first cells ever commercialized, and that was in the 1950s," said Skloot. "You know, you can buy online HeLa cells or products made from HeLa cells for anywhere from about $200 to about $10,000 a vial."

"But it's an incalculable amount of money?" Axelrod asked.

"Yeah," said Skloot.

And consider this: The family of the woman whose cells changed medical history . . . can't afford health insurance.

Henrietta's middle child, Sonny, is $100,000 in debt after bypass surgery.

"How does that leave you feeling?" asked Axelrod.

"Well, it leaves me feeling kind of, not angry, a little bit that I don't have the medical coverage, and then that my mother's cells is being used all over the world for science purpose, and then the medical coverage that we have is zero, me and my brother," Sonny said.

No medical coverage, no money, and there's one more thing the Lackses and Henrietta have gone without: recognition.

"You know, Hopkins got a wing for this and a wing for that," said another Lacks family member. "It would be nice if they had a Henrietta Lacks wing."

Lawrence Lacks, the oldest of Henrietta's five children, said, "Well, one thing I'm going to say is I think it's wrong, out of all that money they made off my mother, she's down there in Virginia in an unmarked grave."

That's about to change.

Just last week Henrietta's family learned the exact location where their mother is buried, right next to her mother, Eliza Pleasant, in the shade on an old oak. A donated headstone will be placed there come spring.

"They used to tell me stories about my mother, you know? She was a giver," said Sonny. "And she's doing it, you know? She's still giving.

"And to me, it just feels good about that. Mama, who gave so much, Henrietta Lacks is still living today."

For more info:
"The Immortal Life of Henrietta Lacks" by Rebecca Skloot (Crown)
Read an Excerpt
rebeccaskloot.com
lacksfamily.com
Henrietta Lacks Foundation

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She Died in 1951, Yet Her Cells Continue to Grow and Multiply, Becoming a Cornerstone of Scientific Research

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Deborah Lacks is Henritta's daughter that has been through it all with these cells. Reporters, press, people who just want answers, scientists, the government, etc. Have all taken advantage of the Lacks Family and given them no compensation.

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Deborah Lacks, daughter of Henrietta Lacks (https://www.wikitree.com/wiki/Lacks-20)

In the midst of her family's battle over HeLa, Deborah Lacks began drafting newsletters about the medical injustice her mother faced at John Hopkins Hospital and handing them out to anyone who would listen to her. Deborah also worked various jobs as a barber, notary public, chemical mixer, grocery clerk, and limousine driver to support both herself and her children.

While searching for information regarding her mother's time at John Hopkins Hospital, Deborah stumbled across an article that was published by Michael Rogers that showcased her mother's medical records. The report detailed Mrs. Lacks' painful death and shocking autopsy. Following the report by Rogers, a German virologist named Harald zur Hausen discovered the Human Papilloma Virus (HPV), a new strain of sexually transmitted disease that affects the majority of sexually active humans and was found to be the cause of Henrietta Lacks' cervical cancer as her cells tested positive for multiple variations of HPV.

Photo of Henrietta Lacks' partial Certificate of Death (https://www.issues4life.org/blast/2013154.html)

For the first time since Mrs. Lacks' admittance, the origin of her cancer was identified and the details of its progression was explained. Dr. zur Hansen revealed that Mrs. Lacks' cancer was a result of HPV inserting in the eleventh chromosome of her DNA and turning off her p53 tumor suppressor gene.

Fortunately, not all of the press surrounding Mrs. Lacks was negative. In 1996, a Georgian scientist named Roland Patillo held the first annual HeLa Cancer Control Symposium, a seminar-based conference where scientists present research on how cancer affects minorities and propose ideas on how to ensure proper treatment of minority patients. Dr. Patillo took his recognition of Mrs. Lacks' contribution to science a step further by having October 11th declared as Henrietta Lacks Day in Atlanta, Georgia. Deborah was ecstatic that her mother was beginning to receive the recognition she deserved for HeLa.

Deborah's elation seemed to be sustained when a BBC producer named Adam Curtis contacted her about filming a documentary on her mother's life and relationship with the scientific community.

BBC Video describing the creation of HeLa and the medical ethics violations that were rampant during the 20th century (https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=FgMUlVl-poE).

We miss you, Mama...I think of you all the time and wish I could see and hold you in my arms, like I know you held me...I keep with me all I know about you deep in my soul, because I am part of you, and you are me. We love you, Mama.

- Deborah Lacks ( The Immortal Life of Henrietta Lacks, p. 221)

Following the press of the BBC Documentary, locals from Clover, Virginia began writing letters to Congress and the mayor's office demanding recognition for Henrietta Lacks within the town. Moreover, the Smithsonian National Museum of American History contacted the Lackses and invited them to an event honoring their mother. In Lacks Town, Mrs. Lacks became a local celebrity. Her face was on t-shirts and posters. The town also set forth groundwork to establish the Henrietta Lacks Health History Museum Foundation, Incorporated.

People came up to Deborah with tears in her eyes and told her that her mother's cells had helped them overcome cancer. Deborah was thrilled.

- Rebecca Skloot ( The Immortal Life of Henrietta Lacks, p. 222)

Nonetheless, not all the press the Lackses received was good press. One evening, the Lackses got a call from a man who went by the name Dr. Sir Lord Keenan Kester Cofield. Cofield proclaimed to be a lawyer and informed the family that they should sue Hopkins so the mistreatment of their mother and wife. He also encouraged them to copyright Mrs. Lacks' name. However, Cofield was a fraud. He had served multiple years in various penitentiaries for fraud and filing unwarranted lawsuits against companies like the Coca-Cola Company, the Four Seasons, and Burger King. Cofield's behavior caught the attention of the FBI and he was resultantly forbidden from filing any type of lawsuits.

Photo of Coca-Cola Company logo, one of the company's that Cofield sued during his "lawsuit spree" (https://www.independent.co.uk/news/uk/home-news/coca-cola-logo-uk-favourite-vintage-collectable-a8484206.html)

After realizing that Cofield was a fraud, Deborah began requesting medical information herself on behalf of her mother. Unfortunately, her inquiry was halted when she was randomly attacked on the bus one day by a teenager. The next day, the same teenager attacked Deborah again, this time damaging several discs in her spine. The stress surrounding the attacks and the fear of another one caused her to break out in hives all over her body. Deborah's breathing became labored and she was admitted to the hospital for observation. The doctors shared with Deborah that her blood pressure had gotten so high that she almost had a stroke. Following her hospital visit, Deborah was placed on multiple medications. However, she was unable to afford them due to her lack of health insurance. Ironically, the daughter of the woman who revolutionized the medical field and helped millions of people overcome their illness could not afford the medication she needed to overcome hers.

I can't say nuthin bad about science, but I won't lie, I would like some health insurance so I don't got to pay all that money every month for drugs my mother cells probably helped make.

- Deborah Lacks ( The Immortal Life of Henrietta Lacks, p. 256)

Between not being able to afford her medications and the constant stress of searching for information about her mother with Skloot, Deborah Lacks suffered a stroke during a church service one morning. Months later, her brother, Sonny Lacks, informed Skloot that Deborah had passed and that he had found his sister in her bed with a smile on her face.

I imagine, what would it be like to have a mother to go to, laugh, cry, hug. God willing, I can be with her someday. I'm looking forward to that.

- Deborah Lacks ( The Immortal Life of Henrietta Lacks, p. 309)

Photo of Deborah Lacks and Rebecca Skloot taken during their first meeting at a Bed and Breakfast in Baltimore, Maryland (https://www.mnn.com/lifestyle/arts-culture/stories/the-immortal-life-of-henrietta-lacks)

Skloot both begins and ends The Immortal Life of Henrietta Lacks with the words of her daughter, Deborah Lacks. Throughout the entire work, Deborah is an essential piece to the information Skloot uncovers in relation to Henrietta Lacks. Skloot does an impressive job of articulating the life of Mrs. Lacks outside of her contribution to science. Skloot also creates a space within her book that readers can enter into with their questions regarding medical ethics and the medical treatment of minorities and vulnerable subjects. Had the laws governing the practice of medicine and the conduction of research been stricter during Mrs. Lacks' time at John Hopkins Hospital, the physicians and researchers involved in her case would have been held accountable for their egregious actions. It is with this understanding that the reminder of these blog posts will reveal more information about the history and progression of medical ethics within the United States with respect to African Americans and other vulnerable subjects like inmates and the mentally compromised.

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Deborah's Journey: A Daughter's Quest for Answers

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Deborah Lacks, daughter of Henrietta Lacks (https://www.wikitree.com/wiki/Lacks-20) In the midst of her family's battle over HeLa, Deborah Lacks began drafting newsletters about the medical injustice her mother faced at John Hopkins Hospital and handing them out to anyone who would listen to her. Deborah also worked various jobs as a barber, notary public, chemical mixer,...

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The Lacks finally get compensated after decades of waiting. In Summer of 2023, the Lacks got some money for the infamous HeLa Cells that were taken without consent. The settlement has been kept confidential.

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Henrietta Lacks’ family reaches historic settlement, wins compensation for her stolen cells

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The success of the legal strategy increases the likelihood that this becomes the first in a series of complaints seeking compensation for, and control of, Lacks’ cells.

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After Henritta's first Radium treatment at John Hopkins Hospital the doctor wrote, "30 year old colored female lying quietly in no evident distress." and "Patient feels quite well tonight. Morale is good and she's ready to go home." (Page 40)

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"But Henrietta's cells weren't merely surviving, they were growing with mythological intensity... They kept growing like nothing anyone had seen, doubling their numbers every twenty-four hours, stacking on hundreds on top of hundreds, accumulating by the millions." (Page 40-41)

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"This was 1951 in Baltimore, segregation was law, and it was understood that black people didn't question white people's professional judgement. Many black patients were just glad to be getting treatment, since discrimination in hospitals was widespread." (64) This quote is showing how white doctors thought it was okay to withhold information about complicated diseases and patient condition as not to frighten or confuse the patient or their family.

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"The way Day remembers it, someone from Hopkins called to tell him Henrietta had died, and to ask for permission for an autopsy, and Day said no. A few hours later, when Day went to Hopkins with a cousin to see Henrietta's body and sign some papers, the doctors asked again about the autopsy. They said they wanted to run tests that might help his children someday. Day's cousin said it wouldn't hurt, so eventually Day agreed and signed an autopsy permission form." (90) If Day hadn't said yes to the autopsy the whole world would be different and less advanced. This moment was one that was supposed to happen even if it caused bad things later for the family.

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Even if the law at the time was you must need consent to take cells for research purposes and cannot take it without consent, do you think because Henrietta was black that they would've taken the cells anyways? I think they would.

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If segregation wasn't an issue when Henrietta was around, do you think she could've gotten better and survived? Maybe a treatment now would help and save her life.