The Immortal Life of Henrietta Lacks
Rebecca Skloot
Pan Books. First published 2010
HeLa cells are used by biologists worldwide to investigate biological processes, to test drugs and other interventions, and more generally in basic research in molecular biology. They are perhaps the most important human cell line, and serve as a model system that can used to prove or disprove theories. Especially in drug discovery, they are used as the first line of investigation when the new compound is ready to be tested on actual animal or human systems, after trying it out by computer modelling, and then on bare proteins in the lab, and before it is tested on live animals, and finally clinical trials on human subjects. What does 'a cell line' mean? It means a bunch of cells that can be infinitely grown and reproduced, and in which the current day versions are very little different from the original few cells that started it all. Bacterial cells do this all the time, i.e. reproduce infinitely. One cell splits into two, and then these two split into four and so on, and on. And the current versions of the cell are almost the same as the original ones. There are many other cell lines which are immortal, some derived from animal cells, some from plants. Plant tissue culture, as cell culture is sometimes called, is also a common way of generating multiple copies of a commercially or otherwise useful plant that can then be grown in large quantities, e.g. in fields, and harvested for whatever useful material. Cell lines from higher animals are very difficult to cultivate and maintain, and there are only a few of them. Human cell lines are the most difficult of all. The value of the HeLa cells is therefore immense, since it is a human cell line relatively easy to maintain, and 'immortal'.
'HeLa' stands for Henrietta Lacks, the cancer patient from whom, in 1951, in a hospital in Pittsburgh, the cells were first isolated from a cervical tumour. According to the book, as part of a long running experiment conducted by George Gey, the cells were then tested to see if they would multiply in a testube, as were cells removed from all cancer patients. Since medical research ethics were in a primitive state, it is doubtful if any 'informed consent' was obtained either from the patient herself or from her family. In any case, when, after some experimentation and adjustment of growth conditions and so on, the cells proved to be immortal, and eminently suitable for laboratory work, they were first announced and then distributed to all the world, whoever asked for it, essentially for free. A few years later, though, as happens often in science, a field of activity dominated by white men, white Americans in particular, the cells were commercialized. Today any researcher can still obtain HeLa cells for his research, but has to pay for them. Not much, but nevertheless a payment has to be made.
Henrietta Lacks herself died of her cancer less than a year after the cells were harvested. Neither she, nor the family she left behind, including a husband and several children, were officially informed about her cells, and how immensely useful they were and continue to be for medical research. HeLa cells have been crucial for the discovery of many, many drugs and treatments, including the polio vaccine. They are found in laboratories around the world, including, of course, here in Madras University. But Henrietta's family never benefited from it. They remained poor, and are disadvantaged to this day. Indeed, when they were finally informed about the cells, mainly on the individual initiative of one or two of the scientists involved, and not as a consequence of any institutional decision, the information given was confusing and, to some of the children, even terrifying. To think their mother's cells were around! To think that their mother's spirit, her ghost was in institutions and laboratories the world over! To think that somehow, someone else, white males chiefly, had taken ownership of a piece, an immortal piece, of their mother! These thoughts angered, saddened and terrified them, though it also made them proud, when, now and then, some one, some journalist or student or scientist, from 'the other side', took the trouble to explain to them just what the cells were and why they were useful.
Skloot's book narrates some of the science behind the discovery, at least its 'human' aspects. But it is largely about the Lacks family. It describes the tribulations of black men and women, descendants of slaves, growing up in Jim Crow America, the legal racism they faced - and continue to face in the 21st century. In the movie 'The Color Purple', based on the book by Alice Walker and directed by Steven Spielberg, the protagonist Celie is told that there is utterly no hope at all of any happiness for her, that she's 'nothing at all, because she is black, poor, ugly and a woman. To judge from the photographs in the book, Henrietta was not ugly, but she was black and poor and a woman, and that would have placed her at nearly the lowermost rung of American society. However, I think that too much should not be made of the fact that she or her family was not informed before the cells were taken - since a white, rich, handsome male would have probably been treated almost the same, as far as this particular aspect is concerned. Of course, what happened after the cells were shown to be infinitely reproducible, that would almost certainly have been different. Given the fact that the cells actually started making money only many years later, and even then only because of the development of maintenance and delivery methodologies, it is unlikely that the person who originally 'donated' the cells, whatever race or social class he or she belonged to, would have benefited monetarily. However a rich white man, and his family, would certainly have been treated with greater respect and honour, with perhaps a wing of the hospital named after him, and so on. Also, though this is not connected to the immortality and utility of the cells, he would probably have been given far better medical treatment and would probably have lived comfortably a few more years.
'HeLa' stands for Henrietta Lacks, the cancer patient from whom, in 1951, in a hospital in Pittsburgh, the cells were first isolated from a cervical tumour. According to the book, as part of a long running experiment conducted by George Gey, the cells were then tested to see if they would multiply in a testube, as were cells removed from all cancer patients. Since medical research ethics were in a primitive state, it is doubtful if any 'informed consent' was obtained either from the patient herself or from her family. In any case, when, after some experimentation and adjustment of growth conditions and so on, the cells proved to be immortal, and eminently suitable for laboratory work, they were first announced and then distributed to all the world, whoever asked for it, essentially for free. A few years later, though, as happens often in science, a field of activity dominated by white men, white Americans in particular, the cells were commercialized. Today any researcher can still obtain HeLa cells for his research, but has to pay for them. Not much, but nevertheless a payment has to be made.
Henrietta Lacks herself died of her cancer less than a year after the cells were harvested. Neither she, nor the family she left behind, including a husband and several children, were officially informed about her cells, and how immensely useful they were and continue to be for medical research. HeLa cells have been crucial for the discovery of many, many drugs and treatments, including the polio vaccine. They are found in laboratories around the world, including, of course, here in Madras University. But Henrietta's family never benefited from it. They remained poor, and are disadvantaged to this day. Indeed, when they were finally informed about the cells, mainly on the individual initiative of one or two of the scientists involved, and not as a consequence of any institutional decision, the information given was confusing and, to some of the children, even terrifying. To think their mother's cells were around! To think that their mother's spirit, her ghost was in institutions and laboratories the world over! To think that somehow, someone else, white males chiefly, had taken ownership of a piece, an immortal piece, of their mother! These thoughts angered, saddened and terrified them, though it also made them proud, when, now and then, some one, some journalist or student or scientist, from 'the other side', took the trouble to explain to them just what the cells were and why they were useful.
Skloot's book narrates some of the science behind the discovery, at least its 'human' aspects. But it is largely about the Lacks family. It describes the tribulations of black men and women, descendants of slaves, growing up in Jim Crow America, the legal racism they faced - and continue to face in the 21st century. In the movie 'The Color Purple', based on the book by Alice Walker and directed by Steven Spielberg, the protagonist Celie is told that there is utterly no hope at all of any happiness for her, that she's 'nothing at all, because she is black, poor, ugly and a woman. To judge from the photographs in the book, Henrietta was not ugly, but she was black and poor and a woman, and that would have placed her at nearly the lowermost rung of American society. However, I think that too much should not be made of the fact that she or her family was not informed before the cells were taken - since a white, rich, handsome male would have probably been treated almost the same, as far as this particular aspect is concerned. Of course, what happened after the cells were shown to be infinitely reproducible, that would almost certainly have been different. Given the fact that the cells actually started making money only many years later, and even then only because of the development of maintenance and delivery methodologies, it is unlikely that the person who originally 'donated' the cells, whatever race or social class he or she belonged to, would have benefited monetarily. However a rich white man, and his family, would certainly have been treated with greater respect and honour, with perhaps a wing of the hospital named after him, and so on. Also, though this is not connected to the immortality and utility of the cells, he would probably have been given far better medical treatment and would probably have lived comfortably a few more years.
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