In 1951, an African American woman named Henrietta is missing She went to Johns Hopkins Hospital (Baltimore, USA) to be treated for cervical cancer. Unbeknownst to her, the cells from her biopsy were removed and made available to biological researchers. Lacks died that same year, but her cell line, known as HeLa, survives.
The cancer cells from this patient were administered to the researcher George Otto Geywho discovered that they did something they had never seen before: they stayed alive and grew up cell culture.
Gey called the champion hela – from the initials of the name of Henrietta Lacks. These were the first human cells to grow in a laboratory and they were ‘immortal‘(they did not die after some cell divisions). Therefore, they could be used to develop many experiments, which represented a huge advance for medical and biological research.
Shortly after Lacksm’s death around 1954, HeLa cells were used by Jonas Salk develop a polio vaccine. To test Salk’s new vaccine, the cells were mass-produced in the first industrial production. The demand for HeLa cells has grown rapidly.
Immortal Lacks’ cells were used to develop AIDS drugshaemophilia, leukemia, uterine cancer and parkinson’s. They have also contributed to advances in reproductive health, including in vitro fertilization, among many others.
According to the World Health Organization (WHO), more than 50 million tons of HeLa cells have been distributed worldwide and have been essential in over 70,000 medical practices.
The use of these cells is the basis of thousands of patents and a million dollar business, but neither she nor her family has ever received any compensation.
Last year, on the 70th anniversary of her death, the WHO Director-General said: “Henrietta Lacks has been exploited. She is one of many black women whose bodies have been misused by science. You put your trust in the health system to be able to receive treatment, but the system took something away from you without your knowledge and without your consent ”.
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