The Immortal Life of Henrietta Lacks Essay

A researcher George Gey was given the cells of Henrietta’s tumor for research. George Gey discovered that Henrietta’s cells were unique and did something by no means seen before; they could be kept alive and grow. Before Henrietta’s cells, cultured cells would only be able to survive a few days. More time was spent on observing and preserving Henrietta’s cells than actually using them for research. It was

The Henrietta Lacks Foundation is a non-profit organization founded by Rebecca Skloot, author of The Immortal Life of Henrietta Lacks, who is donating a portion of her book’s proceeds to the Foundation. Henrietta was a poor black farmer whose cancer cells had damaging consequences for her family who today can’t afford access to the health care advances their mother’s cells helped make possible. The Foundation strives to provide financial assistance to needy individuals who have made important contributions to scientific research without personally benefiting from those contributions, particularly those used in research without their knowledge or consent. The Foundation gives those who

Henrietta Lacks, a woman whose cells have made millions of dollars, but most people don’t know her name, or her story. “She’s usually identified as Helen Lane, but often she has no name at all. She’s simply called HeLa, the code name given to the world’s first immortal human cells – her cells cut from her cervix just months before she died. Her real name is Henrietta Lacks,” (Skloot 1). Through the last few months of her life, she had major struggles with hospitals and scientists. Henrietta was in serious pain throughout the last few months, and the doctor treated her as a specimen. “Henrietta is still a miserable specimen,” (Skloot 66). Another major flaw in Henrietta story is the fact that her family was barely told of her condition of cervical

During Henrietta treatments George Gey, the doctor that was helping her ended up taking cells from her body. He did so due to the fact he discovered that her cells were immortal. He named them HeLa cells using her first and last name in abbreviation. George told the discovery to his colleagues spreading HeLa cells throughout the world. In response the doctors used a variety of ways to go about the cells. For example, “Southampton began injecting prisoners in June 1956 using HeLa cells that his colleague, Alice Moore, carried from New York to Ohio in a hand bag” (Skloot 129). The cells were used for testing on innocent subjects. The discovery may have changed the world, but it will never change the fact they used and abused the cells. Skloot clearly shows the use of the cell provider and her cells. The reader will have a sense of imagery reading along the book because of Skloot’s

The non-fiction book The Immortal Life of Henrietta Lacks, written by Rebecca Skloot, details the happenings and life of Henrietta Lacks, an African American woman and tobacco farmer who became a medical miracle in the 1950’s. The book is written in an attempt to chronicle both the experiences and tribulations of Henrietta Lacks and her family, as well as the events that led to, and resulted from, research done on Henrietta Lacks’ cells. Henrietta was a very average African American woman in this period; she had only a seventh-grade level education, and followed traditional racial and gender roles by spending her time has a mother and caretaker, as well as working on farms throughout her life until the involvement of the US in World War II brought her and her husband, “Day” Lacks, comparatively better work opportunities in industrial steel mills. However, after her death in 1951 Henrietta became much more than average to doctors at John Hopkins when the discovered that cells extracted from her cancerous tissue continued to live and grow much longer than any other tissue samples. Further investigation and isolation of these thriving cells led to the creation of the first ever immortal human cell line in medical history. The incredible progress in medicine made possible by Henrietta Lack’s tissue cells were not without downfalls, though. The treatments and experiences received by Henrietta and the effects it had on her and her family demonstrate both racial and gender

From the moment Dr. Gey took Henrietta's cells without her consent and knowledge, she was no longer seen as human. She became only known as cells in a test tube. She was reduced to the label put on that tube, "HeLa". No longer was she known as a mother who put her children first, a friend, or a beautiful woman who always made

After her death in 1951, for six decades, Henrietta Lacks did not exist in the eyes of the society, but her cells did. How? Well, the answer is quite simple. HeLa Cells are the first immortal human cells. These cells never die and multiply every twenty-four hours. After spending 10 years to perfect her first book, author of The Immortal Life of Henrietta Lacks, Rebecca Skloot essentially captured the life, the death, and aftermath of Henrietta Lacks’ life. With controversial issues regarding science, ethics, race, and class Skloot takes us on an extraordinary journey. From the “colored” ward of Johns Hopkins Hospital in the 1950s to stark white laboratories with freezers full of HeLa cells, from Henrietta’s small, dying hometown of Clover,

Gey was able to contribute to the advancements made in science not only by collecting the cells but also by making an abundance of advancements in the field of cell culture. Being able to collect, cultivate, and ship the cells already contributed to the advancements made not only by making it possible to see the effects of certain diseases and vaccines on human cells but also because it showed new techniques of shipping live human cells: “Gey sent them [cells] via plane in tubes with a few drops of culture medium, just enough to keep them alive for a short time… [or] tucked them into holes carved in blocks of ice to keep them from overheating” (Skloot 57). This in turn allowed Henrietta’s legacy to grow because she could survive a long time with few necessities. Dr. Gey was able to show that in ice the cells slow their processes of metastasizing and this keeps them from dying; thus creating a process called spontaneous transformation allowing for scientist to observe a transforming somatic cell during the process of mitosis. This process was able to make Henrietta’s legacy grow as aiding the formation of the cell cycle. Dr. Gey also made a technique of “growing in suspension” in which “they [HeLa cells] could grow floating in a culture medium that was constantly stirred by a magnetic device” (pg 94) decreasing space required to hold the same amount of HeLa, allowing for more cells and more experimentation, which increased Henrietta’s legacy. Dr. Gey contributed a lot to

The cells taken from the biopsy of Henrietta’s tumor were given to a researcher, George Gey, and her cells became a huge medical discovery because they could survive and multiply indefinitely. These cells were then named HeLa cells. HeLa cells led to many revolutionary medical advances

But Lacks’s story soon became exceptional when her cells were given to John Hopkin’s tissue specialist George Gey. Because when Gey looked at her cells under a microscope he found something he’d been searching for for years.

Dr. George Gey was responsible for Henrietta’s treatment and as a result, gave him access to her cells; this allowed Gey to carry out tests on Henrietta’s cancer cells without her knowledge. This led to George Gey taking and culturing Henrietta’s without permission. That’s when Gey noticed something unusual about the cells, Henrietta’s cultured cells began to expand at a rapid rate, “They kept growing like nothing anyone had seen, doubling their numbers every twenty-four hours, stacking hundreds on top of hundreds, accumulating by the millions” (page 57). This demonstrates the growth of Henrietta’s cells and the importance of this discovery. Gey told his closest colleagues about his discovery which led to him distributing the cells to different

Henrietta Lacks: an unknown name up until recent years. A name that had been known to the world only as HeLa; The first two letters of a name that belonged to a poor African American tobacco farmer that unknowingly changed science and life as we know it today. Her life has finally been portrayed in a very intimate story that not only does her life some justice but also transcendentally brings to mind the philosophical issues concerning medical ethics both of the past, present, and the future. In a world of constantly evolving medical advancement, science is a pivotal force that propels ideas forward. Although most will agree that the knowledge and cures found are a positive aspect, there is also a necessary evil that is involved, including

Henrietta Lacks was a “mother of five who died of cervical cancer at only thirty-one years of age” (Gabbay). When she passed away the doctors at John Hopkins asked her husband,

The woman behind the clump of cells, named HeLa, finally passes after aggressive cervical cancer. Word spreads of her death very quickly to the Gey lab. Gey has an appetite to conduct an autopsy immediately but permission is a necessity. Gey seeks out Day’s permission and finally gets it after a great deal of persuasion. “The way Day remembers it, someone from Hopkins called to tell him Henrietta had died, and to ask 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

Gey found that Henrietta cells were different than the usual cells. It was never happening before when Gey found a cell that grows with mythological intensity in the lab. Usually, every cell will die or survive for a while in the lab. “However, the Henrietta’s cancer cells seemed unstoppable as long as they had food and warmth” (Skloot 65). This was the first immortal human cells that they called HeLa. This name came from the first two letters of the name Henrietta Lacks.