HeLa Cells: Ethical Questions about our Diseased Bodies

"A Lasting Gift to Medicine That Wasn't Really a Gift" by Denise Grady

Here's a New York Time's article I read last year that I thought might be of interest to the whole class. It's about the discovery of HeLa cells, which are a really important line of cells used in labs everywhere for various kinds of experiments. These cells were named after Henrietta Lacks, the patient whose cancerous cells gave rise to the line. As you might imagine, their widespread use has made the production of these cells quite lucrative. In short, her family later fought for the right to receive compensation for the use of their mother's cells. Questions that this article raises are: should a person have monetary rights over their diseased body parts? How might this hinder medicine? How does Mrs. Lack's African-American descent figure into the debate?