Compliance In Focus

There is a new development in the story of Henrietta Lacks, the woman whose cancerous cells were obtained without her consent and developed into the immortal HeLa cell line.  You may recall that Henrietta presented to John Hopkins in Baltimore Maryland in 1951 and was treated for cervical cancer.  During her treatment, her doctors obtained a sample of healthy cervical cells along with a sample of the cancerous ones for testing.  Unexpectedly, Dr. George Otto Gey was able to keep the cells alive in a culture and they have been used without Henrietta’s permission in numerous research studies ever since.  In fact, you can still obtain a sample of HeLa cells today.  Unfortunately, Henrietta was never even informed of this and it wasn’t discovered until over 20 years later when Johns Hopkins contacted her children to see if they would be willing to give blood samples in order to better understand the immortal cells.  Not only has the Lacks family had no say in how Henrietta’s cells could be used, but they themselves have struggled to receive adequate medical care because the family has never been compensated in any way for their mother’s contribution to science.

In 2010, author Rebecca Skloot published the #1 New York Times bestselling book titled The Immortal Life of Henrietta Lacks.  The book is a very thoughtful examination of the moral and ethical principles regarding the lack of consent on Henrietta’s behalf to donate her cells to science.  It is filled with first hand accounts from her family and friends about their experiences that resulted from Henrietta’s unbeknownst scientific contribution.