What is privacy? Well, it’s the state or condition of being free from being observed or disturbed by other people. In terms of information, it is the right to have some control over how one’s own personal information is collected and used. This is a right that has been inherently protected by the U.S Constitution, agreed upon by the Supreme Court, and yet, issues around this very topic arise every day. In The Immortal Life of Henrietta Lacks, the author Rebecca Skloot, addresses this issue in her story of the women behind the infamous HeLa cells. Her story shows that although privacy is a right that is inherently protected by the law, situations of injustice can still occur. Examples of this in the book include when Henrietta’s cells were given to Dr. Gey without any consent from Day, the situation in which Mr. Golde’s spleen was sold without his permission, as well as when the Lacks family were recontacted and mislead about the reasons they were tested years after Henrietta’s death. In violation of Henrietta’s privacy and rights to her property, …show more content…
Johns Hopkins doctor Richard Wesley TeLinde gave a sample of Henrietta’s cells without her nor her family's knowledge. This actually happened twice. Once was when she was alive and the other was when she had just died. As she lay unconscious on the operating table, after being called in for a few tests, the surgeon on duty, Dr. Lawrence Wharton Jr., prepared to treat Henrietta’s tumor. Before he began the treatment, however, he collected samples for TeLinde to give to George Gey: “no one had told Henrietta that TeLinde was collecting samples or asked if she wanted to be a donor-Wharton picked up a sharp knife and shaved two dime-sized pieces of tissue from Henrietta’s cervix: one from her tumor, and one from the healthy cervical tissue nearby. Then he placed the samples in a glass dish”(28). It was common practice for doctors to construct further research using patients’ biological possessions. Henrietta was no exception. The doctors completely disregarded her voice in their taking her tissue, which violated her rights to her biological property. The second time this happened she had just passed away and George Gey had wanted an autopsy done on her. However, he had to ask Day, Henrietta’s husband, because it was illegal to take cells from the dead without permission. Day remembers saying no to the doctors when they called for permission for an autopsy. When Day went to JOhns Hopkins to see the body and sign some papers, “the doctors asked again about the autopsy … [this time, saying] they wanted to run tests that might help his children someday”(67). With it said like that, Day couldn’t say no, so he agreed to a partial autopsy. However, the doctors were only telling Day the ostensible reason why they were performing an autopsy on Henrietta. Essentially, they lied to gain the rights to take tissue samples from her body. The doctors at Johns Hopkins didn’t take patient’s rights into consideration. Their main concern was research, but it would not have hurt to inform the patient of what was being done to their biological property. Similarly to Henrietta, John Moore’s rights were violated when he became sick with tumors that spread all over his body, resulting in his having to get his spleen removed. John Moore was diagnosed with Hairy-cell Leukemia, and appointed to David Golde, who, in short, over several years was developing a cell line called Mo from Moore’s semen, bone marrow, blood, etc. Moore shared that, “Golde had filed for a patent on Moore’s cells, and several extremely valuable proteins that those cells produced … Golde had entered into agreements with a biotech company that gave him stocks and financing worth more than $3.5 million to ‘commercially develop’ and scientifically investigate’ the Mo cell line.”(144-145). Seemingly inspired by HeLa and what it had done for western medicine, Dr. Golde wanted to become famous for finding value in Moore’s cells. Nonetheless, it was at the expense of hiding such information from the very person he was planning to make billions of money from. If Moore hadn’t won his case, he would have gone uncompensated for violation of his privacy. All Mr. Golde had to do was be honest and ask for permission. Meanwhile, the Lackses were fooled again, by the doctors from Johns Hopkins. They were recontacted and mislead to think that they were being tested for the cancer that Henrietta had. However, they were really taking samples from the family to help stop a contamination problem that HeLa was causing. Victor McKusick and Susan Hsu were the doctors conducting these tests on the Lackses. When Skloot asked them years later about why they didn’t try to obtain informed consent from the Lacks family, McKusick replied saying, “I suspect there was no effort to explain anything in great detail. But I don’t believe anyone would have told them we were testing for cancer because that wasn’t the case”(133). Admittedly, the family was misinformed, but McKusick argues that they weren’t told that they were being tested for cancer. However, it was because they were misinformed that the Lackses believed that they were being tested for the cancer that their mother had. What else were they supposed to assume? Moving on, Susan Hsu, responded to Skloot's question saying, “No. We never gave [a] consent form because you just go to draw blood. We are not doing some kind of medical research, you know, not long term. All we wanted was a few tubes of blood and to do genetic marker test. It’s not involved in a human research committee of things like that” (133). Susan made it seem like what was being done was not a big deal. However, if blood needs to be withdrawn from the Lackses to solve a HeLa contamination problem, that is a big deal. It is also a major violation of privacy, because with the tests that were being performed on the Lackses, their genetic information was uncovered. Access to one’s genetic information should not be done without consent. Unfortunately, the Lackses were again the victims of such a violation of privacy. The examples of when HeLa cells were taken without consent, when a line of Mo cells were developed without Moore’s consent, and the Lacks being tested without properly understanding why, show the prevalent disrespect of privacy that some doctors exercised.
In looking at these instances, the doctors seemed to have thought their actions normal. They thought that since they were treating the patient they automatically had access to their cells, tissues, DNA, that they could take without permission and use to develop science or to even become rich and famous like Dr. Golde tried to do. One might say that no matter how useful a person's biological property can be to western medicine and science, it does not excuse the violation of privacy of a patient. Ostensibly, there is no need to worry about a patient saying no if the doctor has moral and beneficial intentions for the use of a patient's private, biological
information.
An abstraction can be defined as something that only exists as an idea. People are considered abstractions when they are dehumanized, forgotten about, or segregated and discriminated against. The scientific community and the media treated Henrietta Lacks and her family as abstractions in several ways including; forgetting the person behind HeLa cells, giving sub-par health care compared to Caucasians, and not giving reparations to the Lacks family. On the other hand, Rebecca Skloot offers a different perspective that is shown throughout the book. Rebecca Skloot’s book The Immortal Life of Henrietta Lacks describes the trials and tribulations the Lacks family has gone through because of HeLa cells and shows how seeing a person as an abstraction is a dangerous thing.
All I can say is amazing information of your glorious and late Henrietta Lacks. This incedible women bettered our society in ways no common human could understand at the time because of how complex this matter was and still very much indeed is. I know there is much contraversy with the matter of how scientists achived immortal cells from your late relative, and I do strongly agree with the fact that it was wrong for these researches to take advantage of this incredible women, but I know it is not for me to say nonethless it must be said that even though it was wrong to take Lacks’ cells when she was dying sometimes one must suffer to bring joy to the entire world.
The Belmont Report identifies three core principles that are to be respected when using human subjects for research. The three ethical principles are: respect for persons, beneficence and justice. In the case of Henrietta Lacks each of these fundamental components are violated. The consent that Henrietta provided was not sufficient for the procedures that were conducted.
People trust doctors to save lives. Everyday millions of Americans swallow pills prescribed by doctors to alleviate painful symptoms of conditions they may have. Others entrust their lives to doctors, with full trust that the doctors have the patient’s best interests in mind. In cases such as the Tuskegee Syphilis Experiment, the Crownsville Hospital of the Negro Insane, and Joseph Mengele’s Research, doctors did not take care of the patients but instead focused on their self-interest. Rebecca Skloot, in her contemporary nonfiction novel The Immortal Life of Henrietta Lacks, uses logos to reveal corruption in the medical field in order to protect individuals in the future.
Most people live in capitalist societies where money matters a lot. Essentially, ownership is also of significance since it decides to whom the money goes. In present days, human tissues matter in the scientific field. Rebecca Skloot, author of The Immortal Life of Henrietta Lacks, shows how Henrietta Lacks’s cells have been used well, and at the same time, how they have been a hot potato in science because of the problem of the ownership. This engages readers to try to answer the question, “Should legal ownership have to be given to people?” For that answer, yes. People should be given the rights to ownership over their tissues for patients to decide if they are willing to donate their tissues or not. Reasons will be explained as follows.
Rebecca Skloot’s novel, The Immortal Life of Henrietta Lacks, depicts the violation of medical ethics from the patient and researcher perspectives specifically when race, poverty, and lack of medical education are factors. The novel takes place in the southern United States in 1951. Henrietta Lacks is born in a poor rural town, Clover, but eventually moves to urban Turner Station. She was diagnosed and treated for cervical cancer at Johns Hopkins hospital where cells was unknowingly taken from her and used for scientific research. Rebecca Skloot describes this when she writes, “But first—though no one had told Henrietta that TeLinde was collecting sample or asked she wanted to be a donor—Wharton picked up a sharp knife and shaved two dime-sized pieces of tissue from Henrietta's cervix: one from her tumor, and one from the healthy cervical tissue nearby. Then he placed the samples in a glass dish” (33). The simple act of taking cells, which the physicians did not even think twice about, caused decades
The book The Immortal Life of Henrietta Lacks by Rebecca Skloot, was a nonfiction story about the life of Henrietta Lacks, who died of cervical cancer in 1951. Henrietta did not know that her doctor took a sample of her cancer cells a few months before she died. “Henrietta cells that called HeLa were the first immortal human cells ever grown in a laboratory” (Skloot 22). In fact, the cells from her cervix are the most important advances in medical research. Rebecca was interested to write this story because she was anxious with the story of HeLa cells. When she was in biology class, her professor named Donald Defler gave a lecture about cells. Defler tells the story about Henrietta Lacks and HeLa cells. However, the professor ended his lecture when he said that Henrietta Lacks was a black woman. In this book, Rebecca wants to tell the truth about the story of Henrietta Lacks during her medical process and the rights for Henrietta’s family after she died.
Henrietta Lacks is known as immortal because her cells are still being used to conduct research. On February 5th, 1951 Henrietta Lacks was diagnosed with malignant cervical cancer that was treated with harsh radiation. During her treatment and surgery of the cancer, she had a biopsy that collected a small portion of her cervical cells. Henrietta’s cells were special because they were able to self multiply under the right conditions. Her cells continue to be reproduced and sold all around the world for research. The question is should Henrietta and her family be compensated for her time and cells? This question will be analyzed from two different perspectives, which is the functionalist and a conflict theory perspective. In this
The novel, The Immortal Life of Henrietta Lacks, is written by Rebecca Skloot. This novel provides a real story regarding research using human tissue without patient’s consent. It gives the background of Henrietta Lacks and the achievements HeLa cells established to point out how fallacious it is for doctors to take the cells without asking. Through the unique pattern and devices, Skloot expresses her sympathy for the right of consent of medical research.
Imagine having a part of your body taken from you without your permission, and then having those cells that are a part of your body grow and are being processed in labs around the world and then ultimately being used for the highest of research. That is what happens to Henrietta Lacks. In the book, The Immoral Life of Henrietta Lacks, we see Henrietta Lacks and her families story unravel, the numerous hardships that they faced, and the shocking revelation that their relative cells were being used for research without her consent and theirs.
How would you feel if you were able to save millions of lives and not be credited for it in the slightest. Furious, irritated, sad or even apoplectic, this is what happened to to family of the late Henrietta Lacks. Henrietta Lacks was an African American woman whose cancer cells were the source of the HeLa cell line, one of the most important cell lines in medical research ever discovered. With the major impact that Henrietta Lacks had on the medical community, her and her family received absolutely nothing in compensation. Henrietta Lacks's cells were the first to be observed that could be divided multiple times without dying, which is why they became known as "immortal." which is what gives the book about her the title the book has. When discussing Henrietta Lacks, there are multiple topics but the main topics are about tissue rights, compensation and the medical ethics.
The story of Henrietta Lacks and her family is one that raises many questions about ethics, consent, medical treatment, and family rights. The decisions made by the scientists and doctors surrounding HeLa research have had lasting impacts in the Lacks family. The question I have chosen to address is what change would have helped the Lacks children the most. I feel the most influential piece to the Lacks children’s suffering was being raised by Ethel. This portion of their life was filled with physical and emotional abuse that led to destructive behavior. This behavior would also play a role in the anger toward HeLa researchers and anyone else who did harm to the family or left them in the dark. Although questions about their mother, financial
Privacy (Pri-va-cy) n.1.the state or condition of being free from being observed or disturbed by other people. Americans fear that technological progress will destroy the concept of privy. The first known use of wiretap was in 1948. It’s no secret that the government watches individuals on a daily bases. According to the constitution, the Fourth Amendment serves to protect the people from unreasonable searches and seizures by the government. Unreasonable is the word that tips the balance On one side is the intrusion on individuals’ Fourth Amendment rights and the other side is legitimate government interests, such as public safety. What we consider reasonable by law, the government might not think so. The word ‘privacy’ seems to be non-existent today in the 21st century; the use and advances of technology have deprived us of our privacy and given the government the authority to wiretap and or intervene in our lives. Our natural rights we’ve strived for since the foundation of this nation are being slashed down left to right when we let the government do as they wish. The government should not be given the authority to intervene without a reasonable cause and or consent of the individual
As we may all know our right to privacy is a human right and an element of various legal traditions which may restrain both government and private party action that threatens the privacy an individual’s background. These two men named Warren and Brandeis wrote that privacy is the “right to be let alone”, and focused on protecting individuals. The right to privacy is out own right to keep a domain around us, including things around us such as our own body, home, property, thoughts, feelings, secrets, and our identity. We have our right to choose who we let to access our parts also as to contro...
Privacy is defined by many as the ability for a person to act as they desire -these actions being legal of course- without being observed by other people. Privacy is a right granted to all American citizens in the fourth amendment which states “people have the right to be secure in their persons, houses, papers, and effects against unreasonable search and seizures”. Although our founding fathers could have never predicted the technological advancements we have achieved today, it would be logical to assume that a person's internet and phone data would be considered their effects. This would then make actions such as secretive government surveillance illegal because the surveillance is done so without probable cause and would be considered unreasonable search or seizure. Therefore, access to a citizen’s private information should only be provided using probable cause with the knowledge and consent of those who are being