“If they’re doing research
on Henrietta, she though, it’s only a matter of time before they come for
Henrietta’s children, and maybe her grandchildren” (Skloot 180).
When Bobbette Lacks discovered that her mother-in-law’s
cells were being used in research and sold among scientists she was extremely
upset that it was unknown to the entire family. This was to be a problem she
thought because once Henrietta’s family found out this news, they were going to
have a difficult time coping. Once
Bobbette relayed this news to her husband Lawrence he called Day to explain what
his wife had just told him which was that “part of your mother, it’s alive”
(Skloot 181). During this same time HeLa cells were causing a great
contamination problem for labs across the world. It was vital that scientists
contact the Lacks family to try and develop and identify genetic markers to
identify which cells were Henrietta’s and which were not. This was going to involve
her immediate family giving DNA samples to compare them to HeLa’s genes. One of
the scientists stated that her family still went to Johns Hopkins, so it was
not difficult to locate them. This was the beginning of an emotional time for the
Lacks family because they were not fully informed about what was going on. It
was especially hard on Deborah who assumed that she was going to get caner from
the tests the doctors were giving her. Overall, this was a challenging time for
the family and it was a life changing event for both them and the scientific
community.
Word Count: 237
Skloot, Rebecca. "The Immortal Life of Henrietta Lacks" New York. Broadway Paperbacks, Crown Publishing, 2010. Print.
“What?!’ Bobbette yelled, jumping up from her chair ‘what you mean you got her cells in your lab” (Skloot 180)
ReplyDeleteI completely agree with you that this turn of events marked the beginning of a challenging time for the Lacks family. I couldn’t imagine finding out that after twenty five plus years your relative, who was thought to be completely gone, still has live cells that are being worked on in a lab without your knowledge. After Learning about the scientific tests Bobbette thought it was “only a matter of time before they come for Henrietta’s children, and maybe her grandchildren” (Skloot 180) which is a completely logical thought given the recent discoveries. What’s to stop places like John Hopkins from doing the same to the other lacks family members if the need for more data arises? Though I still believe the hospital was LEGALLY in the right to do what they did, I can completely understand how they family felt now based on Bobbette’s reaction to learning about the cells and their testing. If I had been in that position I would have wanted some action to be taken. The more I read this book, the more I feel for the family. As the author adds more and more interactions and thoughts of the family members into the book, I start to see more of Henrietta as person then as a statistic or colony of reproducing cells.
Word count 238
“By testing Henrietta’s children, they hoped to find out what Henrietta’s HLA markers might have been, so they could use those to identify her cells.” (Skloot 182).
ReplyDeleteThe beginning of the harassment the Lacks’ saw was with the conference of geneticists that wanted to get DNA from the Lacks children, whom had children of their own by now. Day and the kids thought they were being tested for cancer when Hopkins called about getting blood tests done. They wanted to make sure they didn’t have the cancer their mother died of. Dr. McKusick didn’t care how the DNA samples were attained he just wanted them to further his research and make a better name for himself. I find it extremely sad that the Lacks children were put under the stress of a “cancer test” when the truth would have sufficed. They deserved to know that their mother’s cells were saving lives and furthering genetic research and scientific knowledge across the globe. That information would have saved a lot of heartache and confusion. “They said they got my wife and she part alive” said Day to Rebecca Skloot years after Dr. Hsu called him about getting blood tests (Skloot 182). Day was very confused by the science terms Dr. Hsu used when describing what the tests were for. If someone had just sat down with Day and the Lacks children from the very beginning to explain the importance of Henrietta’s cells I’m sure they would have been a lot more cooperative with tests and reporters.
(227/254)
“Gardenia’s brother-in-law told Bobbette that Henrietta’s cells had been all over the news lately because they’d been causing problems by contaminating other cultures. But Bobbete just kept shaking her head and saying, “How come nobody told her family part of her was still alive?”” (Skloot, 180)
ReplyDeleteI agree with you when you say that the cause of her anger was the fact that Henrietta’s cells were being used in culture without their knowledge, however, I do not think that the full scope of the problem was that it would be hard for the family to cope. I think what really angered Bobbette was that Henrietta had been dead for almost twenty five years and no one ever thought to once inform the family until they needed them for more research. The scientists did not contact the Lacks family to give them their long deserved recognition, but instead wanted to use them as subjects just like how they used Henrietta. They would have a somewhat difficult time coping with the news that her cells were alive, but this did not change the fact that Henrietta had died 25 years ago; the cells were not the person that the Lacks family knew and loved, they were just cells being used for research. The fact that the scientists tracked her family down to accomplish their own ends is sickening. What is even worse is that they did not fully explain to them what was going on. It was like history was repeating itself; they had done the same thing to Henrietta and now they would do it to her children and her grandchildren simply to get what they wanted.
Word Count: 230
Skloot, Rebecca. The Immortal Life of Henrietta Lacks. New York: Broadway Paperbacks, 2010. 180. Print.
"What you mean you got her cells in your lab?"
ReplyDelete“What you mean you got her cells in your lab?”(Skloot, 180)
ReplyDeleteI totally agree that the family reaction to this news is normal. They just found out that any scientist around the world can have her cells. Nobody cared about the family when they started using Henrietta cells and now that they need their help they just come up to them like they hadn’t done any damage to the family. The world has benefit a lot from this cells as well as people have acquire lots of money because of this cells and they have never gotten compensated for any of this. This also brings some worries to the family in thinking they might have also got cancer and this might be why they are looking to test them or could it be because they also want to steal their cells as they did Henrietta’s by lying to them. In a situation like this is normal to react this way and not wanting to cooperate with this scientist because they really have no right to be asking of this to the family. Especially after such a long time has pass by and them not knowing anything about Henrietta cells and this being the first time that anyone has come told them anything about them. (Word Count 203)