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Bioethics & Medical Ethics

Henrietta’s Story

Vincent Lotz asks who should have the decisive power over someone’s cells after their death: their family, or the medical community?

HeLa cells are an immortal line of human cervical cancer cells used in medical research. They are called ‘HeLa’ cells from their initial host’s name, Henrietta Lacks. Lacks was an African American woman with little formal education, raised on a tobacco farm in rural Virginia. Born in 1920, she experienced the full impact of racial discrimination left over from the years of slavery in the United States. In 1951, shortly after the birth of her fifth child, Lacks fell seriously ill with cervical cancer.

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