Immoral Use of HeLa cells

           Everyone has been to the doctor’s office, had some type of surgery, or has gotten blood drawn for a test.  It is rare to question these things because they are normal, reoccurring things in today’s society but when you have something removed from your body, whether it is during a surgery or when blood is drawn, do you ever wonder where your excess body parts go?  Have you ever wondered if hospitals or doctors’ offices have closets full of removed body parts and tissues stored in little jars?  It is rather scary to think about but sometimes your body parts, tissues, or cells are used in research without your knowledge.  This happens all of the time and has created great controversy in the medical field, raising the question of morality.  Is it ethical for research to be performed on someone’s cells, organs, or anything that came from their body without their full knowledge and consent?  Although consent forms are needed in today’s society, most people do not fully read the document they sign, giving consent for researchers to use their cells, blood, or organs.  Whether a consent form is given or not, the questions of ownership and morality arise.

            The story of Henrietta Lacks was just one of several where the use of her cells were used for research without her consent.  Henrietta Lacks was a poor black woman

Dr. George Gey

residing in Virginia, in a town called Turner Station when she noticed that something was irregular with her body.  She was sent to Johns Hopkins Hospital because it was one of the only hospitals at that time to accept colored people.  She was diagnosed with cervical cancer and preceded to receive radium treatments at the hospital.  This was an old method of treatment where a tube of radium was placed inside of her to kill the cancer cells.  When she was receiving her treatment, a biopsy of her tumor was taken without her knowledge.  The biopsy was then sent to George Gey’s lab, where it was discovered that Henrietta’s cells continued to divide at a rapid pace (Skloot, 2010).  “Gey named the cells “HeLa cells”, in honor of their source’s name, but claimed them as his own discovery, and spent the rest of his life profiteering from them.  This is when the first ethical dilemma arises; Henrietta Lacks had no idea that a sample of her tumor had been taken and sent to George Gey, and that her own cells would be used as a basis for medical research for decades to come. Her husband David knew that a sample had been taken, but was told that it was to see if the cancer was hereditary, and that it might help his children if the cancer struck again. Despite being told this, David Lacks never heard from the research team again. There is a question then, of whether appropriate consent was given” (Kirkham, 2009).  Although in this time, no legal consent was needed to take specimens and perform research, this practice could still be considered unethical.  In this particular case, it is unethical even though consent was not legally needed, simply because Henrietta’s family had a right to know what was going on but were kept in the dark for several years. 

           I personally believe that what happened to Henrietta and her cells was unethical, despite the fact that consent was not legally needed at this time.  If the scientists tried to conceal the identity behind HeLa, they obviously felt that they had something to hide.  Also, the fact that they made billions of dollars off of someone else's cells doesn't seem right to me.

"The Immortal Life of Henrietta Lacks"

     Researchers have been making great advancements within the medical field ever since a magical cell line was discovered, called HeLa cells.  HeLa is the name of one of the first human cancer cell lines that researchers used to perform experiments on because it was the first to continue growing out of the host’s body.  In fact, these cells grow so rapidly that they were given the nickname “immortal cells”.  When you mention the HeLa cell line to scientists and other people, they often associate HeLa with the research the cells were used in or the progress that was made as a result of the use of HeLa.  Does anybody ever stop to think where these miraculous cells came from?  It was not until somewhat recently, that it became public knowledge as to where HeLa cells were obtained.  For many years the identity of the woman the cells were extracted from was concealed, but now her identity has been publically announced as Henrietta Lacks.  Neither her, nor her family had any knowledge of the use of her cells for research, but

back when it occurred, consent was not needed to use human specimens.  If it was not considered illegal to use Henrietta Lacks’ cells without consent, then why was her identity kept secret for such a long period of time?  This question then raises the idea that maybe the researchers knew that what they were doing was unethical.  

     The book, The Immortal Life of Henrietta Lacks, written by Rebecca Skloot, gives the reader insight about the woman with the “immortal” cell line, explains the events that took place in order to obtain the cells and how they were then used in the scientific field.  The book does this in a way that can be somewhat confusing at first, because it jumps around between several years, but there is a helpful timeline at the beginning of each chapter to guide the reader.  Skloot first provides the reader with great detail of Henrietta’s life and progresses into the use and importance of her cells, and then continues with her personal interactions with the Lacks family and how this situation has affected them.  It was surprising to see how little the family knew about Henrietta’s cells and how mistreated they were by doctors when they went searching for answers. Although it is quite evident the stance that Skloot takes, she does not pressure her opinions on the reader and allows them to interpret Henrietta’s story in their own way. 

     Henrietta Lacks was a poor black woman living in a town called Turner Station who noticed something was terribly wrong with her body and was sent to Johns Hopkins Hospital.  At this time, Johns Hopkins was one of the only hospitals that allowed colored people to be cared for, since nearly no doctor wanted to work with people of color.  Henrietta was diagnosed with cervical cancer and while receiving radium treatments, a procedure where a tube of radium was placed inside the body in attempt to kill the cancer cells; a biopsy was taken of her tumor without her knowledge.  That biopsy was sent to a lab, George Gey’s lab, where it was discovered that the now termed HeLa cells were able to continuously grow.  They were the first cells to grow successfully in culture, allowing millions of research to be performed on them.  These cells were then sold all across the world, allowing scientists to make a fortune, while Henrietta’s family was clueless; raising the question of morality.

HeLa Cells: Are They Important?

           Cancer is a growing disease throughout the world, causing more than one million deaths per year in the United States alone.  In order to decrease the number of deaths, and possibly prevent them altogether, research needs to take place.  For many years, researchers have been using cells called “HeLa cells” to perform their research on cancer.  These HeLa cells are a very important contribution to researchers, not only for advancements in cancer, but also for advancements in other fields.  They helped create the first polio vaccination, were tested in outer space, used for understanding cancer cells, and are continued to be used in most research. 

These cells were not concocted in a laboratory; they were extracted from a woman suffering from cancer named Henrietta Lacks.  Henrietta Lacks was a poor African-American woman infected with cervical cancer at the age of thirty.  While she was receiving treatment at the Johns Hopkins Hospital in Baltimore, the doctors took some of her tumor cells without her knowledge.  The researchers soon found out that the tumor cells of Henrietta Lacks could be kept alive and grown.  The fact that they could grow and replicate was extremely shocking and they were deemed “immortal”.  “They can grow indefinitely, be frozen for decades, divided into different batches and shared among scientists” (Zielinski, 2010).  In fact, the now called “HeLa cells” were being sold to other researchers across the world for millions of dollars.  Since these cells were being sold all over the world, most researchers used the “immortal” cells in their studies, allowing for great advancements to occur.  Even though the selling of Henrietta Lacks’ cells for profit could be considered unethical by many, without the spread of her cells to other scientists, some of the advancements in science might not have occurred.

The first great advancement in the sciences that involved the cells of Henrietta Lacks was the creation of the polio vaccine.  “Jonas Salk used HeLa cells to grow the polio virus and he tested the vaccine on HeLa cells before its use on human in 1955” (Cantwell, 2010).  It was not until he had used HeLa cells that his vaccine began to work, therefore, if these immortal cells had never been harvested, it would have taken several more years to create a polio vaccine.  It is also possible that without HeLa cells; there would still be no polio vaccine.  Henrietta’s cells were also used in “…helping to develop medicines to fight cancer, the flu and Parkinson’s disease, and in the research that led to gene mapping and cloning.  They were used to test the effects of atomic radiation and sent into outer space” (Claiborne, 2010).  Without the existence of HeLa cells, all of these advancements would have occurred at a much later date or not at all.  The cells of Henrietta Lacks’ are definitely the most influential in the science world because they have been used to acquire enormous amounts of knowledge, allowing the world to become much more advanced.