Western Medicine In The 20th Century

The 20th-century was a time period where Western Medicine underwent many triumphs and tragedies. Along with the development of life saving technologies and vaccines, came violation of people’s trust and abuse of professional power. One event that stands out significantly occurred in the mid 20th-century, not only changed Western medicine forever, but affected many other parts of the world, as well. An immortal line of cells was discovered. This meant that these specific cells would never die, could be studied in great detail, and used in various experiments that couldn’t be done with living human beings. These cells were called HeLa and are still referred to as such today, and have been involved in the development of the polio vaccine and other

She had been feeling pain during sexual intercourse and even felt inside of herself to see what the pain in her “womb” was. This young woman, named Henrietta Lacks, had never heard of the world cancer and never thought that she might have it. She just knew that something was wrong and painful and eventually sought medical attention. Her doctor recommended her to a specialist at Johns Hopkins, so they could get a better understanding of her problem. Henrietta was not thrilled as she entered the colored ward of the Johns Hopkins where all black people could be treated in this time of segregation. Dr. Howard Jones ended up finding a nickel-sized tumor on the inside of Henrietta’s cervix. Doctors, and even Henrietta, did not seem too concerned with the tumor size and attached radium tube inserts to the tumor, as this was a standard procedure for cancer in the mid

In this time period of cell culture work, there had not yet been anyone who had developed an immortal cell line, which could be used over and over throughout various experiments. To Gey’s surprise, and soon to be everyone else’s, Henrietta’s cells multiplied at a rapid rate and never seemed to die if treated properly. Gey and his employees had discovered the first immortal cells in science, but they had no idea the importance of what they were about to introduce to the world. Gey sent out some the original HeLa cells to other scientists across the country to be used in other types of research. He did not charge any money for the distribution of these cells, nor did he try to patent “HeLa cells” or even publish what he had discovered. He was simply a man dedicated to science and one who realized its importance to the future of