She was almost 24, and she knew her mother had grown sick and died when she was not much older. (At the time, the NIH was still developing guidelines for the use of human tissue in research.)ĭay told Deborah that some doctors wanted to draw her blood for a cancer test, and Deborah panicked. Day interpreted Hsu's request as a test for cancer (recall that the doctors who pushed him to sign Henrietta's autopsy form had said this might lead to research that would help his children avoid developing cancer).īecause this was merely a blood draw and Hsu assumed the Lackses were familiar with the research being done with Henrietta's cells, she didn't explain why she was doing this and did not have them sign any consent forms. However, Hsu had recently come from China and did not speak fluent English, and Day was unfamiliar with the fine points of scientific research. Hsu called Day and asked if she could draw blood from him and his children. Victor McKusick, a Hopkins geneticist, tasks his post-doctoral fellow Susan Hsu with obtaining the samples. Given the contamination problem, they decide that the best way to proceed will be to develop tests that can distinguish HeLa from other cells, and that the best way to accomplish that goal will be to obtain samples from Henrietta's surviving relatives, who share her DNA. In 1973, a group of researchers gathers at Yale University to begin the mapping of the human genome. She tells Lawrence that part of his mother is alive he calls Hopkins attempting to find out what they're doing to his mother, but the receptionist has no idea what he's talking about. This recalls the frightening stories she heard about Hopkins doctors kidnapping Black people for experimentation, and Bobette becomes afraid that doctors might come to take Henrietta's children and grandchildren away for experimentation as well. However, when Gardenia's brother-in-law asks if she died of cervical cancer at Hopkins in the fifties, Bobette is certain that this is the same woman.īobette is confused by this explanation, and only understands that part of Henrietta is somehow still alive and being experimented on. Bobette is shocked and incredulous - this was her mother-in-law's name, but Henrietta has been dead for nearly 20 years. He is surprised to hear that Bobette's married name is Lacks, and remarks that the cells he works with supposedly come from a woman named Henrietta Lacks.
Journalists and scientists began to seek the true identity of Henrietta Lacks.Īround the same time, Bobette Lacks is spending time with her friend Gardenia, and she is introduced to Gardenia's brother-in-law, who works at the National Cancer Institute. Mainstream newspapers began to pick up the story of the contaminated cell line, rousing national interest in the woman behind HeLa. There was still some debate in the field that this was a problem at all, but scientists such as Walter Nelson-Rees were publishing the names of tainted cell lines as well as the scientists who were using them in research, so there was an impetus to make sure the samples were clean. With this flood of new funding, scientists had the resources to tackle the contamination problem-the invasion of HeLa into other cell lines. In 1972, Richard Nixon signed the National Cancer Act into law, launching the War on Cancer and designating $1.5 billion for cancer research over the next three years. Most impressively, this article represented the first time that Henrietta's real name appeared in an article about the HeLa cell line. They also discovered that Henrietta had had a more aggressive type of cancer than they had previously realized (she had an adenocarcinoma instead of an epithelioid carcinoma), which may have explained why her cancer spread so aggressively but wouldn't have necessitated different treatment. After Gey died, several of his colleagues decided to write an article about the history of the HeLa cell line, and they uncovered Henrietta's medical records in the process. Shortly before his death, Gey told his assistant Mary that it would be okay to release Henrietta's true name. Still determined to help science, he underwent experimental chemo treatments with terrible side effects.
Gey wanted his lab assistants to create an immortal cell line like HeLa from his tumor, but during surgery, they discovered that his cancer was so widespread that they worried cutting into it would kill him. In the spring of 1970, George Gey becomes ill and discovers that he has incurable pancreatic cancer. “The Fame She So Richly Deserves” … 1970–1973
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