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Immortal Cells: Henrietta Lacks By Rebecca Skloot

386 Words2 Pages

Henrietta Lacks, also known as HeLa, is the woman with the immortal cells. Those famous cells eventually would lead to breakthroughs in studies about leukemia, influenza, Parkinson's disease, etc. However, the other side of the story is hardly known. Rebecca Skloot and Deborah Lacks, Henrietta’s daughter, work together to find the unethical methods in which the Lacks family was treated.

Racism/Sexism- African-Americans were treated like lab rats and were tested on without their permission or knowledge. Especially black women, like Henrietta, were pushed away in the women’s rights movement for being colored and pushed away from the civil rights movements for being women.
Cells- Henrietta’s cells are “immortal” meaning they reproduce rapidly and don’t stop doing so. This led to major breakthroughs in the medical world and allowed scientists to experiment effects of toxins and cures.

“If the whole profession is doing it, how can you call it 'unprofessional conduct'?" (Skloot, 134)

Skloot wrote this book to unveil the injustices that the Lacks family and many other African-Americans went through. The key passage shows that many medical professionals used the “everyone else is doing it” defense to justify their unethical behavior. The doctors dehumanized Henrietta and used her cells to make millions and become famous. One of the themes of this book is …show more content…

I was drawn into this book since it gave me so many opportunities to learn more about science. Even though some of the descriptions of Henrietta’s cervical cancer were graphic, it helped me learn more about biology which is what I’m interested in. For example when it said “They cut HeLa cells apart and exposed them to endless toxins, radiation, and infection. They bombarded them with drugs, hoping to find one that would kill malignant cells without destroying normal ones.” (58), I learned how they used Henrietta’s cells to help millions of

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