This is another book recommended to me by my wife. Her recommendation once again led me to read a fascinating book. However, she continues to recommend books that don’t have a happy story or ending.
This book by Rebecca Skloot introduced me to a subject I hadn’t read about before. The book begins by describing how a doctor treating Henrietta’s cervical cancer shaved samples from cancerous and noncancerous areas. He gave the samples to George Gey, who had built a laboratory out of spare parts and had worked unsuccessfully for years to grow malignant cells outside the body. The cells were taken without Henrietta Lacks knowledge or permission and were labeled “HeLa.” Cells from the cancerous tumor began to replicate at an enormously rapid rate. When Gey finally determined that his lab had grown the “first immortal human cells” he began sharing samples with colleagues. The word spread and Gey was sending samples all over the country and then the world. A huge medical research industry was developed to grow cells and use them in experimentation that has resulted in the cure to many diseases. There is no way of knowing how many of Henrietta’s cells have been grown but it is estimated that there are several tens of metric tons.
The story of Henrietta’s disease and treatment is quite sad. I looked back at the picture of Henrietta on the cover of the book several times as I read the book. When I first looked at the picture I thought she looked “saucy.” After reading about her I decided that word was critical and changed to the word “confident.”
There are disturbing details about Henrietta’s treatment in a “Negro” hospital. I didn’t get the sense that she was treated differently than any other patient. It is obvious that cancer treatment in the 1950s was “experimental.” Radiation treatments charred Henrietta’s skin from her breasts to her pelvis a deep black. A friend who saw the burns told her, “…they burnt you black as tar.” The radiation did not stop the growth of the cancer and it spread throughout her body. She was swollen, receiving frequent blood transfusions, and in severe pain until her merciful death.
A HeLa factory was built soon after Henrietta died to grow her cells for use in research on polio. A factory at the Tuskegee Institute was soon growing an estimated 6 trillion cells a week. The cells helped prove the Salk vaccine to be effective at preventing polio. Other large factories were constructed specifically for the sole purpose of growing HeLa cells for an endless list of medical research.
Questions about medical research ethics are raised by the book in several sections. There were several instances in which black subjects were exposed to disease to research the progression of symptoms. As ann example, black men were either given or had syphilis and were only monitored to understand how the disease progressed. This and the portrayal of blacks living in segregation when Henrietta was a little girl to the end of her life brings home how short a time it has been since blacks were relegated to being “second class citizens.”
Henrietta’s family thought George Gey to be a villain and resented that multi-billion dollar businesses were developed because of HeLa cells while the family received no compensation and couldn’t afford health insurance. They of course resented that the early descriptions of the origin of the cells did not even get Henrietta’s name correct. She was referred to as Helen Lane or Larson in early references. I understand their resentment, but did not get the sense that Gey was a villain. He personally gained little from his work, resisted publishing papers about HeLa, and spent his life basically being rewarded by his passion for his research. I don’t recall anywhere in the book that he ever sold HeLa cell; he gave them to whatever researcher requested them. I can’t criticize a man who paid the salary of a dead employee for three months before someone noticed he was doing it and forced him to stop. The book makes the point several times that Henrietta as a black woman was exploited by white scientists. With due respect to her family, I don’t, after reading the book, feel that George Gey was one of those scientists.
On the other side of the ledger, the family’s resentment resonates. One of the companies that sells HeLa cells charges from $100 to $10,000 per vial. It is astonishing that as of the printing of the book there were seventeen thousand patents involving HeLa cells!
The book goes through several lawsuits filed by people to claim ownership of cells from their bodies. The Supreme Court of California ruled against those people. The court ruled that “When you leave tissues in a doctor’s office or lab, you abandon them as waste, and anyone can take your garbage and sell it.” I don’t quite understand how a doctor taking samples from Henrietta’s cervix equates to leaving tissues in a doctor’s lab, but that is apparently that was what was decided.
The explanation for why Henrietta’s cells were able to replicate so rapidly was discovered thirty years after her death. A German virologist discovered that Henrietta’s cells contained a sexually transmitted virus that produces a protein leading to cancer and is exceptionally virulent. My interpretation is that Henrietta had the misfortune to be the wife of a man who gave her several sexually transmitted diseases to include the virus.That led to her cervical cancer that killed her and created a huge medical industry to include important research into HIV.
The science and medical research information given in the book is far too detailed to give a decent quick summary. Anyone interested in medical research should read at least the first half of the book. I suggest the second half should be read out of respect for the author’s diligence in working to research the subject for years while living off of student loans and credit cards. However, I will warn that as “99 Effervescent Faces” writes in a review on Amazon that the second half “…becomes less about HeLa, science, history, and ethics and instead turns exclusively into a memoir about Skloot’s dealings with the family.” I recommend the book with the caveat that the first part of the book is better reading than the second half.