...The Immortal Life of Henrietta Lacks by Rebecca Skloot, involves a great amount of various topics, from race, to gender, to cancer. A woman named Henrietta Lacks was an African American woman battling cervical cancer in the 1940’s until her death in 1951. As doctors tried to help her and find a cure for her, they had to study her cells and the cancerous cells. It was during the study of her cells that they realized her cells never died; in fact, her cells reproduced indefinitely. There are many ways to support the thesis of the book, exploring the ethics in medical research, and this book is relatable and significant to U.S. history involving medicine, race, gender, etc. The book, The Immortal Life of Henrietta Lacks, was written because the...
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...her cells to other researchers around the world without her family’s consent. Moreover, the Lackes themselves were used in medical research without informed consent, and Henrietta’s medical records were release to journalists without her family knowing. These are issues because the cells of Henrietta lack were used to create “immortal” cells that provided a steady supply of cells for medical research and allowed to find cure for multiple diseases, and guaranteed the medical industry millions of dollar when her family his struggling to pay for healthcare. Moreover, researchers at Johns Hopkins asked the Lack’s family to give blood sample to test for cancer when in fact, the sample were used solely to identify their mother’s cell. The researchers never contacted back the Lack’s family, and some of them still wonder if they have the same cancer that killed their mother. These issues in this case concern the broad category of consumer confidence issues where employers and employees have responsibilities to their customers or clients. Johns Hopkins, a healthcare provider institution, and its doctors and researchers who are the care giver had responsibilities to their patient Henrietta and her family. In addition, the case is concerned with the specific are of fiduciary responsibilities, and client confidentiality and privacy. The researchers at Johns Hopkins had the fiduciary responsibility to respect Henrietta’s basic human rights by seeking her consent before using her cells...
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...An impoverished black woman who lived in the time of segregation and racism, she contracted cervical cancer and received treatment from Johns Hopkins hospital, where a sample of her cancer cells were sent to Dr. George Gey for research without her express permission. While this at first may not seem like a momentous event, there were far reaching impacts of this collection according to The Immortal Life of Henrietta Lacks, a nonfiction account of the event, by Rebecca Skloot. The book follows the story of the Lacks family, exploring how Henrietta’s cells, dubbed “HeLa” cells, resulted in the first self-sustaining “immortal” cell line, solved multiple medical issues, spawned a multi-billion dollar industry, and ignited a debate on an individual’s ownership over their body. The Lackses were not informed in any way about the extraction of her tissue until 20 years after her death, and have not received a cent of compensation for the cells Henrietta contributed. The case is a prime example of the exploitation of an individual for financial purposes, with pharmaceutical companies making billions and the Lackses still poor and struggling...
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...August 3, 2011 The Immortal Life of Henrietta Lacks Loretta Pleasant, also known Henrietta Lacks, Hennie and many other names was born August 1, 1920 in Roanoke, Virginia. Henrietta was a poor African American woman who worked as a tobacco farmer. She lived with her parents and eight older siblings. After her mother Eliza died from giving birth to her tenth child, Hennie along with her brothers and sisters, were distributed amongst the family and Hennie ended up living on hillside with her grandfather, Tommy Lacks in his home-house. It was a four bedroom log cabin with plank floors and gas lanterns. Once Loretta moved in with her grandfather, she met and married her first cousin David Lacks after their two children were born. Henrietta Lacks and David, also known as Day, had a total of five children; Sonny, Dale, Elsie, Lawrence and Joe. Elsie was their second child. She was born with epilepsy, a disorder of the nervous system. Once diagnosed, Elsie was sent to an institution known as the Hospital for the Negro Insane in Crownsville, Virginia. While she was residing at the institution, scientists were running tests on patients without consent. The scientists would drill a hole into the patients’ brains and drain the fluids to get the images of their brains, which led to major symptoms such as dizziness and vomiting. On January 29, 1951, Henrietta traveled to John Hopkins Hospital after noticing a lump inside of her cervix and bleeding consistently. John Hopkins was the...
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...The Immortal Life of Henrietta Lacks Henrietta Lacks, was an African- American raised by her grandfather with a lot of her cousins. She grew up in Virginia a very kind women who would take care of anyone but could also take care of herself. She was short and beautiful. Henrietta and her cousin David married when she was twenty and he was twenty-five. Both were hard working. Henrietta gave birth to five kids and the oldest was put in a mental institution. Henrietta developed cervical cancer in her early thirties. While in a colored hospital named Hopkins, Doctor Howard Jones took samples of Henrietta’s normal cells and of her cancerous ones. The doctors expected the cells to die after a short period of time like all other cells do. To their surprise Henrietta’s cancerous cells did not die, they multiplied. This was amazing to the doctors. The cells were immortal but Henrietta was not and died in 1951. Doctor Jones sold the cells to any other doctors interested. Doctors used the cells for all types of tests without informing the family or giving them money from the profit they made from the cells which they called HeLa. Some doctors made factories which were only for the production of HeLa. Later when the family found out about the cells they were very upset that the doctors didn’t ask for permission to use her cells and that they didn’t acknowledge Henrietta. David could not take care of the kids himself so he remarried and had two cousins move in to help. Ethel, one of the cousins...
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...In the story of The immortal life of Henrietta Lacks by Rebecca Skloot the death of the Henrietta was the reason for her familys reoccurring struggles. Henrietta was the homemaker, the one who took care of everyone and she was the one keeping the family together. Right before Henrietta dies she tells her sister Gladys “You make sure Day takes care of them children” ”Especially my baby girl Deborah”. (Page 85-86) Henrietta’s death resulted in neglect, physical and sexual abuse, and the rest of her children suffering their adult lives. The neglect was depicted by the death of Elsie. Gladys tells Day “Henrietta gonna die tonight “ “She wants you to take care of them kids – I told her I’d let you know. Don’t let nuthin happen to them.” (Page 86) Right after Henrietta dies Elsie dies in the...
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...I read the book The Immortal Life of Henrietta Lacks by Rebecca Skloot. This book is about the life of Henrietta Lacks, or as she is known to the medical community “HeLa”. This book caught my interest because I wanted to know why the doctors took her cells without her knowledge, and how the family members felt about “HeLa”. This black, tobacco farmer’s cells provided many vital tools and approaches in medical fields around the world. The Immortal Life of Henrietta Lacks crafts for readers a life of a small town woman, working to sustain her family and friends and the affects her life(and how it ended) had on others, so that she is much more than some genetic example in a textbook reading. There is one quote at the beginning of the book, in the praises from other writers and magazines, made by Hilary Mantel that states “ No dead woman has done more for the living”. I think that this statement sums up The Immortal Life of Henrietta Lacks very well and is indubitably appropriate. The first part of the book is explaining how the author, Rebecca Skloot, came into contact with HeLa and the great lengths she went through to get together with Henrietta's family. After this Skloot delves into the life of Henrietta, through information brought forth by the Lacks family. Henrietta had gone the John Hopkins Hospital in Baltimore, complaining of a lump in her cervix. Three months later she was diagnosed with cervical cancer. Unbeknownst to Henrietta, during a surgery to remove her cancer...
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...SPECIAL REPORT CRACKING THE CODE OF THE HUMAN GENOME Henrietta Lacks' cells were essential in developing the polio vaccine and were used in scientific landmarks such as cloning, gene mapping and in vitro fertilization. (Courtesy of the Lacks family) Henrietta Lacks’ ‘Immortal’ Cells Journalist Rebecca Skloot’s new book investigates how a poor black tobacco farmer had a groundbreaking impact on modern medicine By Sarah Zielinski SMITHSONIAN.COM JANUARY 22, 2010 1.3K 31 6 14 73 17 7.7K 1.3K31147367.7K Medical researchers use laboratory-grown human cells to learn the intricacies of how cells work and test theories about the causes and treatment of diseases. The cell lines they need are “immortal”—they can grow indefinitely, be frozen for decades, divided into different batches and shared among scientists. In 1951, a scientist at Johns Hopkins Hospital in Baltimore, Maryland, created the first immortal human cell line with a tissue sample taken from a young black woman with cervical cancer. Those cells, called HeLa cells, quickly became invaluable to medical research—though their donor remained a mystery for decades. In her new book, The Immortal Life of Henrietta Lacks, journalist Rebecca Skloot tracks down the story of the source of the amazing HeLa cells, Henrietta Lacks, and documents the cell line's impact on both modern medicine and the Lacks family. Who was Henrietta Lacks? She was a black tobacco farmer from southern Virginia who got cervical cancer when she...
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...The Immortal Life of Henrietta Lacks tells the story of Henrietta, an African-American woman whose cells were used to create the first immortal human cell line. Told through the eyes of her daughter, Deborah Lacks, aided by journalist Rebecca Skloot. Deborah wanted to learn about her mother, and to understand how the unauthorized harvesting of Lacks cancerous cells in 1951 led to unprecedented medical breakthroughs, changing countless lives and the face of medicine forever. It is a story of medical arrogance and triumph, race, poverty and deep friendship between the unlikeliest people. There had been many books published about Henrietta’s cells, but nothing about Henrietta’s personality, experiences, feeling, life style etc. This caught Rebecca’s...
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...Life of Henrietta Lacks, by Rebecca Skloot, Skloot reveals to readers the intimate details of the life, and lives of those related to, Henrietta Lacks. Henrietta was a poor black woman who had an extremely aggressive case of cervical cancer and the cells taken from her tumor were found to be able to grow on long after her death, providing an amazing test subject for scientists and researchers everywhere. These cells, called HeLa, helped develop a polio vaccine and have helped scientists to learn about and treat vast amounts of other illnesses. But despite this triumph for the medical field, throughout the book, Henrietta’s descendants continue to be cloaked in poverty. Henrietta’s body made these researchers millions and her family continued to live in poverty despite their mother’s amazing contribution to science. Skloot creates this theme of poverty throughout the book by really immersing herself into the lives of Henrietta’s children and telling their stories throughout the book as well. She emphasizes the contrast between the success and wealth of the developers of HeLa with the poverty of the family of the...
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...The Immortal Life of Henrietta Lacks Henrietta Lacks was born into a poor African American family of tobacco farmers in Roanoke, Virginia in 1920. She was sent to live with relatives in Clover, Virginia after the death of her mother. She later married her first cousin, Day, in 1941. After the Great Depression and World War 1 the couple moved to Bethlehem, Maryland where there was a job opportunity for Day at the steel mill. Here they bought a home in Turner Station. Henrietta and Day had five children: Lawrence, Elsie, David (Sonny), Deborah, and Joseph. While Henrietta was pregnant with her fifth child in 1951 she noticed a lump in her abdomen. She was referred to Johns Hopkins Hospital in Baltimore, Maryland. Here she was diagnosed with...
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...The Immortal Life of Henrietta Lacks is, arguably, two different stories. It is the story of Henrietta Lacks and her family. It is also the story of Henrietta’s cancerous cells and how their impact on science changed her family forever. Henrietta Lacks explores racial and economic inequality and how they worked together to create an extremely unjust situation for the Lacks family. Henrietta Lacks was an African-American woman who lived in Jim Crow era America. As such, when she fell ill, she did not have many options when it came to medical care. She went to her local doctor and was misdiagnosed. Her last option was to go to Johns Hopkins: the only hospital Lacks could afford that would treat African-American patients. It was miles away. When she finally arrived, she was sent to the “colored” ward. It was in this ward that her cells were harvested without her knowledge. This experimentation without the patient’s consent...
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...Henrietta and the Lacks family Henrietta Lacks an Afro-American woman born August 1, 1920, in Roanoke, Virginia and later migrated to Dundalk (formerly Turner Station), Maryland. Henrietta married to her cousin David “Day” Lacks, they had five children; Lawrence, Elsie, David, Joseph (aka Zakariyyan Bari Abdul Rahman), and Deborah. In February 1951, Henrietta listened to Howard Jones, a gynecologist at John Hopkin Hospital, diagnosed her with Epidermoid Carcinoma of the Cervix Stage 1. Then eight months later, Henrietta enters into her final rest on October 4, 1951. What made her demise different from other related death, is that her cancerous cells changed medical history. Henrietta cancer cells killed her, it metastasized throughout her...
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...1) In 1973, Bobbette Lacks and Gardenias’ brother in law were meeting in the dining room of Gardenia’s row house in Washington, DC. The two began conversing and soon found out that Gardenia’s brother-in-law worked at the hospital that, unbeknownst to the Lacks family, housed Henrietta’s cells and was using them for cancer experiments. Later in the chapter at Yale University, researchers from Hopkins meet and discussed a contamination problem that manifested with the Henrietta Lacks Cells “HeLa,” Their solution is to ask the Lacks family for DNA/ cell samples to create and map of Hela cells. The lacks family is unaware that research has been ongoing with Henrietta’s cells and the only reason they need the family’s cells is to stop the cross...
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...Born with the name “Loretta Pleasant” in August 1920 in Roanoke, Virginia; She later changed her name to “Henrietta.” Her mother, Eliza Lacks Pleasant, who later died 4 years after giving birth to Henrietta. After her mother passed away Henrietta along with her father, Johnny Pleasant, and other siblings moved to a family home of Clover, Virginia. There in Clover where Henrietta met her husband Day, they grew up together and got married on April 10, 1941. She gave birth to five beautifully children, where she started to feel pain within her cervix after her fourth child. Henrietta Lacks was a beautiful mother and wife who loved her family, she was known to have a beautiful soul who care for everyone. Henrietta life all went downhill after she made a visit to doctors at Hopkins Hospital, where she found out that she had stage 1 cervix cancer. Mrs. Lacks made a visit to Hopkins Hospital where they ran multiple test, because she had been feeling pain within her cervix. During Mrs. Lacks visit Dr. TeLinde removed tissues from the lump inside her vagina, which her later passed...
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