The city of Roanoke, Virginia, announced that a statue of Henrietta Lacks, designed by artist Bryce Cobbs, will be erected in place of that of General Robert Lee, the Civil War Confederate leader, unbolted during the Black Lives Matter movement in July 2020. In 1951, Henrietta Lacks, a young black mother in Baltimore suffering from cervical cancer, had her tumor cells harvested without her consent. She had died the same year. The cells having proved to be exceptionally resistant, gave rise to a line called HeLa (for Henrietta Lacks), widely used throughout the world for medical research. According to the World Health Organization (WHO), they have enabled the development of the polio vaccine and major advances in the fight against cancer and AIDS. However, this contribution had remained largely ignored until the publication, in 2010, of the book by journalist Rebecca Skloot The Immortal Life of Henrietta Lacks (Calmann-Lévy, 2011, for the French version)
At the press conference announcing the decision on Dec. 19, Ben Crump, the lawyer for the Lacks family, praised the symbol. “In the past we have commemorated many men with statues that divided us, he has declared. Here in Ranoake, Virginia, we will have a statue of a black woman that unites us all. » Several institutions had already honored the memory of the young woman. In 2018, the Smithsonian Institutions unveiled a portrait of her. In 2021 the University of Bristol, UK erected a first statue of her. The WHO, for his part, is now dedicating an annual award to him. “In paying tribute to Henrietta Lacks, WHO underlines the importance of recognizing past scientific injustices and promoting racial equity in health and science”WHO Director-General Tedros Adhanom Ghebreyesus said at the time.
The city’s call for grants far exceeded the $160,000 goal. Entrusted to the sculptor Larry Bechtel, the statue should be inaugurated in October 2023. It will sit in the square, renamed “Crown Plaza”.
