I just heard the author interviewed on CBC radio and have ordered this book from Amazon:
The Immortal Life of Henrietta Lacks by Rebecca Skloot.
Henrietta Lacks was the woman whose cells, now called HeLa cells, have been used in scientific research for decades. It is a story that makes you want to pull your hair out and set it on fire.
The Immortal Life of Henrietta Lacks
The Immortal Life of Henrietta Lacks
Dig deeper.
Eek.
<a little icky>
I have not worked with HeLa cells. The biochemistry of multicellular lifeforms is overly complicated for my tastes. But they're very commonly used as a model of a human cellular system, even though they don't really qualify as human (compared to a normal human cell, they're pretty effed up). However, they are easy to grow and apparently, unlike most animal cell lines, they grow in suspension, meaning you don't need to have them fixed to the bottom of a special growth flask. One of the labs in my former department would come up to ours to harvest their HeLa growths. They'd bring in a rack of six 1 L centrifuge bottles, all full of cloudy magenta media and spin them down and there'd be white pellets of HeLa cells at the bottom. Freaked me out every time, though I'm not sure why - we did the same harvesting bacteria. Maybe it was just that lurid magenta of the media. Or maybe it was just that growing up six liters of domesticated E. coli is pretty normal. In fact, that was a small prep by the standards of my group and the neighboring lab. Six liters of immortal cervical cancer, on the other hand, is trip straight to Uncanny Valley.
<a little icky>
<a little icky>
I have not worked with HeLa cells. The biochemistry of multicellular lifeforms is overly complicated for my tastes. But they're very commonly used as a model of a human cellular system, even though they don't really qualify as human (compared to a normal human cell, they're pretty effed up). However, they are easy to grow and apparently, unlike most animal cell lines, they grow in suspension, meaning you don't need to have them fixed to the bottom of a special growth flask. One of the labs in my former department would come up to ours to harvest their HeLa growths. They'd bring in a rack of six 1 L centrifuge bottles, all full of cloudy magenta media and spin them down and there'd be white pellets of HeLa cells at the bottom. Freaked me out every time, though I'm not sure why - we did the same harvesting bacteria. Maybe it was just that lurid magenta of the media. Or maybe it was just that growing up six liters of domesticated E. coli is pretty normal. In fact, that was a small prep by the standards of my group and the neighboring lab. Six liters of immortal cervical cancer, on the other hand, is trip straight to Uncanny Valley.
<a little icky>
When you can do nothing what can you do?
Her family has never made one cent from her cells, although various corporations have. Worse, her family was NEVER consulted at any time in any way. Worse, even NOW, they largely do not understand what happened or what happens to HeLa cells.
It's the saddest thing. Her husband (who barely had a grade 3 education) thought that scientists had HER in "a cell" in a lab.
That's just one awful little part of the story.
It's the saddest thing. Her husband (who barely had a grade 3 education) thought that scientists had HER in "a cell" in a lab.
That's just one awful little part of the story.Dig deeper.