Henrietta Lacks Research Paper

The Great Depression was a time of economic disaster for the United States. Henrietta Lacks experienced this era at a young age which resulted in her living on a tobacco farm in a shed and lived with many of her cousins and grandfather. She was known to be very attractive, caring, and loving, especially to her children who she had as a teenager with her cousin who was her husband later in life.

The Immortal Life of Henrietta Lacks is a book written by Rebecca Skloot that touches on many important issues. Of the dozens of issues referenced in the book, the one that stands out the most to me is bioethics. Bioethics is “the study of the typically controversial ethical issues emerging from new situations and possibilities brought about by advances in biology and medicine.” Bioethics plays a huge role in the story of Henrietta Lacks.

brown skin. Who died of cervical cancer in 1951 but a few months before her

The perception of what is right and wrong is always changing because of history. In particular, laws in the past were considered just, but as years passed people began to question the extent at which these laws were just. Various medical laws and bioethical issues pertaining to Henrietta Lack’s cells being stolen are discussed in Rebecca Skloot’s non-fiction work The Immortal Life of Henrietta Lacks. A question Skloot addresses in the book is, “Wasn’t it illegal for doctors to take Henrietta’s cells without her knowledge? Don’t doctors have to tell you when they use your cells in research?” (Skloot 315). In her nonfiction work The Immortal Life of Henrietta Lacks Skloot employs authoritative warrants to argue that while it was not illegal

What if you had the ability to save several lives through something only you had ? Wouldn’t you like to be told and given proper credit? Well unfortunately that is not case for Henrietta Lacks. Henrietta held a powerful and significant key which has helped as a cure for many things and is still being used till this day . I choose to write about Henrietta due to the fact that she is one of histories and science unsung hero’s.

The Immortal Life of Henrietta Lacks is about a poor African-American woman that died from cervical cancer at Johns Hopkins Hospital in 1950, but in the end it turns into religion and spirituality. I know that there are many religions, but do not know much about religion and how it can affect people’s lives. The book also shows how Lack’s family believes in God, the struggle of Lack’s family with the creation of those cells, how the cells got used by people, and the sad part when Deborah wants to know who her mother was and the Lacks family could not afford a health insurance.

As for the family members who shall receive benefits, the children and grandchildren of Henrietta, for example Lawrence, Zakariyya, and Davon, should receive actual monetary and health benefits. As for the descendants after Henrietta’s grandchildren, they should receive at the least free health care. This can be compared to the health insurance families of American soldiers receive, VA Health Care. These families receive these aids because their loved ones have risked their lives for the good of the country. For the families of Henrietta the same principle applies; Henrietta’s cells have saved and continue to save so many lives in this country and others. As for the amount of money to be bestowed, that can be decided once the corporations who shall compensate the Lacks are identified. Often times when medical research and the term compensation come into contact many academics claim it is the end of scientific study. Scientists worry that stringent regulations requiring specific consent for any future uses of bio specimens could hamstring

In the photo of Henrietta and David Lacks, the photo is expressing a fake front to the audience that Day and Henrietta are ‘happy’ despite their personal struggles with Henrietta’s health and Day’s unfaithfulness. Henrietta’s facial expression is showing a deep sadness as she attempts to smile knowing her medical condition is getting worse, while Day’s facile expression is showing guilt and uncertainty. The facial expressions of both Henrietta and Day are clearly showing on the inside they are fight personal demons and are truly not happy with themselves and each other. The absence of wedding rings are a crucial part in this photo. Showing that Day and Henrietta throughout their relationship have not committed themselves to getting married

Henrietta Lacks died in 1951 of cervical cancer, leaving behind a husband, five children and some cells taken from her without her permission. These cells continue to revolutionize the scientific field today and have played an integral role in some of the most important advances in medicine: cloning, chemotherapy, gene mapping, the polio vaccine and in vitro fertilization. The Immortal Life of Henrietta Lacks answers a lot of questions regarding the Lacks family, but also poses a number of questions regarding ethics, consent and how far society is willing to go to make medical advances.

The book “The Immortal Life of Henrietta Lacks” brings up a problem in society that was a serious obstacle in the field of medicine in the 1950’s. This problem is that the individual rights of a human versus the general need of humanity. The general need of humanity is much more important than the rights of a human.

This passage is interesting because Henrietta will be living forever, literally. There are over billions of cells of her. She has traveled the world in such a short time and also has been a part of nearly every new medical vaccine or cure there will ever be. It just goes to show you how science works. One person can change everything.

First, the waver that Henrietta signed at John Hopkins gave permission for her doctors to (according to Skloot) (2010) “perform any operative procedures…that they deem necessary in the proper surgical care and treatment of _________________,” (pg. 31). Henrietta’s cells were taken, but not for treating her cancer. Second, because of her race and economic status, Henrietta was an easy target. . In 1951, at John Hopkins, when Henrietta received treatment at a colored operating room. Because of this segregation, The treatment was not as well and the doctors had the ability do take advantage of her but Henrietta did not have much of a choice. In the operating room, Richard TeLinde did not ask her permission to take her tissues, Even if he had, Henrietta would not have been able to say no. Skloot (2010) describes this as a time of “benevolent deception” (pg. 63), where the doctors hid information from the patients at the hospital and patients didn’t question doctors, especially when the doctors were white and the patients were black. This is what made Henrietta such a target at John Hopkins. Additionally, no one thought to tell Henrietta afterwards what George Gey had discovered about her special

The social contract of nursing is important because it reflects the nursing's code of ethics, which is to provide care to all who are in need, regardless of their cultural, social, or economic standing. The social contract exists because we rely on a guideline to continue to provide ethical care that is within our scope of practice. Unfortunately, in Rebecca Skloot’s (2010) book, “The Immortal Life of Henrietta Lacks” there were many ethical violations throughout the whole process about the Henrietta Lacks’ cells (HeLa). The author reveals the story about the life of Henrietta Lacks, an African American woman who was diagnosed with a fast-growing cervical cancer at a young age. The cells retrieved from her cervical tumor became the first immortal cell that could survive in the lab and replicate continuously without dying. Without the consent of Henrietta Lacks and her family, these cells later became key components to the development of many groundbreaking inventions such as the polio vaccine and in vitro fertilization. Therefore, the purpose of this paper is to examine the social covenant of nursing in relation to the ethical issues behind the use of the HeLa cells without the patient’s and her family’s consent.

The main ethical issues in this case is that researches at Johns Hopkins Hospital used Henrietta’s cell in multiple researches and send her cells to other researchers around the world without her family’s consent. Moreover, the Lackes themselves were used in medical research without informed consent, and Henrietta’s medical records were release to journalists without her family knowing.

The truth is the doctors that took Henrietta’s cells were doing it for a good cause. They didn’t do it to ruin her and her family’s life, they did it to help people and save lives. There were no laws prohibiting the taking of one’s cells, in fact in a later Supreme Court of California ruling, it was actually defended. When tissues are removed from your body, with or without consent, any claim to ownership