Henrietta Lacks Research Paper

Henrietta Lacks was born on August 1, 1920 in Roanoke, Virginia. Henrietta’s mother passed away in 1924. She was sent to live with her grandfather. Henrietta shared a room with her first cousin David. They had their first son, Lawrence in 1935 when she was fourteen. Then they had their first daughter in 1939, Elsie, who was disabled. Henrietta and David then moved to Maryland and had three more children, David Jr., Deborah, and Joseph.

In 1951, Henrietta Lacks was diagnosed with cervical cancer at John Hopkins Hospital. Without any consent, Henrietta’s doctors took tissue samples from her cervix and attempted to grow them and keep them alive. These cells, known as HeLa cells, began to grow at an unbelievable rate; The HeLa cell became vital for the development of vaccines and other scientific research. However because of Henrietta’s race and economic standpoint, Henrietta Lacks and the rest of the Lacks family was exploited by doctors. The exploitation of the family allowed the doctors and researchers to benefit scientifically and monetarily.

Henrietta Lacks was an African American woman who was born on August 1, 1920 in Roanoke, Virginia. She lived with her mother until the age of four and then she moved in with her uncle on a tobacco plantation after her death. While staying there she ended up sharing a room with her first cousin David “Day” Lacks, after sharing a room with him for many years, in 1935 Henrietta had their first child at the age of fourteen, they named him Lawrence, then, four years later they had their second child Elsie and then in 1941 they were married.

Henrietta Lacks was born on August 1, 1920 and passed away on October 4, 1951. Towards the end of Henrietta’s life, it was filled with pain and doctors attempting to save her, or at least find something useful for the science or medical field. On the bright side, she did have the pleasure of seeing her children and husband while staying in John Hopkins. Rebecca Skloot’s The Immortal Life of Henrietta Lacks illustrates the importance of family in hard times, along with the racist health care system and the advances made in science to prove that even through something detestable, something superior will come of it.

We had to read a book that was written about the HeLa cells and all that they have done. The title of the book is The Immortal Life of Henrietta Lacks and was written by Rebecca Skloot. The cells that were taken from (He)nrietta (La)cks are so special because they were the first human cells ever grown in culture that were immortal. They never die, and they reproduce at great speeds. HeLa cells helped aid the progression of gene mapping, vaccines for various of diseases and also replaced the use of animals in some cosmetics

Bringing Henrietta to Life: Creating Dialogue on Disparities across Disciplines Henrietta Lacks was a woman who made an eye-opening breakthrough in medicine in the early 1950s. Her cells were the first immortal cells to be discovered which paved the way for developing the polio vaccine, cloning, gene mapping, in-vitro fertilization, and more. Unfortunately, there are two sides to every story. Although, modern medicine would not be where it is today without Hela cells, Henrietta’s family continued to struggle with her legacy because of the health disparities associated with ethics, race, and medicine. Henrietta’s cells were taken without her knowledge and used to cure various medical conditions.

In the book of The Immortal Life of Henrietta Lacks, explains that Henrietta Lack was born on August 1, 1920. She had 10 brothers and unfortunately her mother died when she was giving birth to her tenth child. The decision his father made was to return to Clover, Virginia with his family. Since he did not have the patience to raise children, he decided to divide the children with his family. Henrietta stayed with her grandfather. The house where Henrietta's grandfather lived is a home-house, it had four rooms, where once the slave’s quarters and inside of the house was cold. Another grandchild who lives with his grandfather was David Lack (Day). Henrietta and Day each day got up at four in the morning, to work in the plantation of tobacco, corn, peanuts and greens. Another of his tasks were milk the cows and feed chickens, hogs and horses. Unfortunately, Henrietta could not have a united family because her mother died. As we can see Henrietta attend only to six grade of school.

In the year 1951, an African American woman known as Henrietta Lacks died of cervical cancer. Unknowingly, her cancerous cells would later be discovered as the first immortal human cells. These cells were then referred to as HeLa by Doctor Gey, who was a tissue expert at the Hopkins Hospital. Her cells were discovered as the first human cells without her ever knowing they had been removed from her body and cultured. Rebecca Skloot, a journalist, and author of The Immortal Life of Henrietta Lacks embarked on a journey to discover more about Henrietta Lacks’s struggle, pain, and efforts to get treatment. Henrietta nor her family members were ever told of the cultured cells, but would later find out and be very upset. They would be shocked

HeLa cells have influenced polio vaccines, cell cloning, chromosome studies, isolating stem cells, and much more. Although HeLa cells have raised high profits, it is very surreal how Lacks daughter Deborah and the family complains about how they are not able to afford doctors. Still in 1954, Henrietta Lack’s family do not know her cells are still alive. The unethical practices continue in 1966 as Head of Virology at Sloan-Kettering Institute

Mary Kubicek went through the same procedure with Henrietta’s cells as she had done with hundreds before, writing HeLa on each of the vials of cells in culture. At the time, she was just taking the first two letters of Henrietta Lacks’ first and last names to make a short form, as was done with all of the other cells. Little did she know that the name she just wrote (HeLa) would soon be a common word in laboratories around the world. The Gey laboratory had been trying for years to get human cells to reproduce outside of the body, but most cells that they worked on died quickly and the few that didn’t, hardly grew at all. Some hours after placing the cells into the vials, Mary returned to check on them, not expecting anything to have happened, as had been the case hundreds of times before. When she looked in the vials, the cells had grown and started to reproduce, so she had to move some into new vials to let the cells have more room to grow. She told George Gey, but he didn’t want to get very excited since they still could die any minute. But the HeLa cells continued to grow, reproducing an entire generation every 24 hours, and they never

The woman commonly known as Henrietta Lacks is a woman who's cells were unrightfully used by scientists for their own benefit. Although her cells have caused great achievements and scientific discoveries in science she was never credited for her unauthorized donation of cells. Henrietta Lacks might not even be her real name, and because of this the cells have been referred to as the HeLa cells. Consent has always been a major issue in scientific discovery and scientific testing, but no one specifically gave the scientists promotion to remove cells from Henrietta Lacks dead body.

A type of cell that was discovered to be immortal has become a source of controversy as a result of its origin. These cells were taken from a woman called Henrietta Lacks and hence they are now referred to as HeLa cells. The dispute emerged as a result of the lack of permission given by Henrietta for a sample of her cells to be taken and used for scientific purposes. One side argues that the doctor operating on Henrietta was unjustified in taking this sample and that the family of Henrietta, though the woman herself is now deceased, should be given an amount of the profits gained through HeLa cells. However, from a more logical and open minded perspective, one will recognize the importance of these cells in scientific studies along with the

The Immortal Life of Henrietta Lacks talks about many ethical issues and goes into detail of where exactly Henrietta’s cells have gone after her death. Around 1951, Henrietta was diagnosed with cervical cancer and without informing HeLa, the doctors at John Hopkins took a tissue sample from the cervix. The doctors hoped that the cells would grow and help in scientific discovers. Later on when Henrietta died, the cells became helpful in scientific research such as vaccines and many more medical discovers. If Henrietta had been in charge of the cells and declined the doctors use of them then no discovers would’ve been made and who knows what would’ve happened with certain medical discovers that came out of using HeLa’s cells. Rebecca Skloot’s book, The Immortal Life of Henrietta Lacks, explores this question and how the family handles the situation when discovered what exactly happened to HeLa’s

In the photo of Henrietta and David Lacks, the photo is expressing a fake front to the audience that Day and Henrietta are ‘happy’ despite their personal struggles with Henrietta’s health and Day’s unfaithfulness. Henrietta’s facial expression is showing a deep sadness as she attempts to smile knowing her medical condition is getting worse, while Day’s facile expression is showing guilt and uncertainty. The facial expressions of both Henrietta and Day are clearly showing on the inside they are fight personal demons and are truly not happy with themselves and each other. The absence of wedding rings are a crucial part in this photo. Showing that Day and Henrietta throughout their relationship have not committed themselves to getting married

The utilization of stored clinically derived human tissue in biomedical research invokes significant ethical concerns over the inherent value of human tissue, informed consent and property rights to ones tissues. In this paper I will argue that standardized informed consent for all future use of human tissues should be legally required but individual ownership over these tissues should not be recognized nor monetarily compensated. I explicate my argument from the approach of virtue ethics and the ethics of care. I introduce the case of John Moore and the cell line, Mo, derived from his tissues to illustrate the moral concerns with regard to the doctor-patient relationship in