The Immortal Life of Henrietta Lacks by Rebecca Skloot - Literature review Example

Section/# The Immortal Life of Henrietta Lacks Summary: In her book The Immortal Life of Henrietta Lacks, Rebecca Skloot tells the personal struggle and scientific triumph associated with the life, diagnosis of cancer, treatment, death, and continued life via her cell samples of a young black woman in her book in 1950s America. What is interesting about this story is that it does not tell the story from a purely scientific or a purely personal approach. The author has skillfully mixed both approaches and found a way to detail both the personal struggles that Henrietta faced during her lifetime as well as what led to the miraculous discovery that human cells could be cultured and grown into the future. Henrietta came into the doctor’s office complaining of abdominal pain. The doctor’s soon took samples (without her permission) and examined these only to find that she was suffering from cervical cancer. Although she was not a rich person, she was able to receive treatment for the cancer by way of radium tubes inserted into her cervix. His primitive method was one of the most advanced at the time but was unable to save her life. The story makes a slight detour at this point and details the efforts that Rebecca made in order to gain the personal background that has helped to make the book as engaging and insightful as it is. Rebecca recounts how she reached out to Henrietta’s daughter in order to gain valuable insight into the woman that is responsible for the first “immortal cell line”. Through these efforts Rebecca is able to obtain rare and never before seen personal correspondence and journals from Henrietta up to and including the time she was diagnosed with malignant cancer. As the story progresses, the reader is met with the intertwining story of Henrietta’s slow demise and the difficult efforts that Rebecca experiences with regards to getting further background information on what can only be described as an amazing woman. What the author does in Chapter 10 is an interesting technique. As the reader is met by the fact that Henrietta’s cancer is untreatable and all the doctor’s of that time could do was provide her with pain relief, Rebecca diverges from the immensely depressing story to tell of her success in finally having Henrietta’s relatives agree to meet with her and be interviewed. Although nothing can take away from the sadness of the piece, Rebecca helps to divert the reader’s attention from the heavy topics surrounding Henrietta’s slow demise. Equally striking is the backwards and uninformed information that Rebecca notices when she meets with Cootie , Henrietta’s cousin. Rebecca soon finds out that members of Henrietta’s extended family believed that Henrietta was somehow possessed with a spirit that was allowing her cells to live on. Cootie even went to far as to call this some type of voodoo. Says Skloot, “All of the papers said that scientists were continuing to study Henrietta’s cells, but the Lackses didn’t seem to know what the research was for” (Skloot 6). Due to a fundamental lack of understanding, the family automatically assumed the worst. When the medical professionals contacted the family to obtain consent to take blood samples in order to track the genetic markers, a Chinese graduate student was employed to do this and was not fully able to transmit the necessary information to the family. Upon a better understanding of precisely what was going on, the family divided between those that sought to understand what specifically was being done to Henrietta’s cells and how and those that wished to be compensated for the large amount of money that had been made from the biological matter that had already been sold by a host of medical labs. Likewise, the story goes on to discuss the means by which new and developing laws would affect the treatment of an individual’s biological matter both before and after one’s death. The author relates the case of an individual who signed a consent form to give up any and all rights to his spleen and the subsequent cells that might be cultured from it. In this way, the story tracks the developments of medical law and the ways in which biological and tissue began to develop a strict set of laws that governed their usage. Returning the story to the Lacks family, the author relates how Deborah, Henrietta’s daughter, remarried and Zakariyya was in and out of prison and only able to hold work intermittently. Furthermore, the additional children suffered from narcotics abuse and minor run ins with the law. Meanwhile, Deborah continues to research what has happened to her mother and how the cells are being used. A subsequent documentary by the BBC helped to acquaint the family, due to the fact that they were interviewed, regarding precisely what had transpired with the HeLa project. Lastly, the author relates the way in which the legal back and forth between John’s Hopkins and the family served to add even more stress and concern to the family with regards to how they felt they had been manipulated from the very start. Response: There are many more themes that are taking place in Rebecca Skloot’s book than merely that of a black woman being diagnosed with cancer and the subsequent medical discovery that occurred. What Skloot does is present to the reader a detailed portrait of a woman, a mother, an African American, a worker, and a wife of segregated 1950s America. Rather than just detailing the events that took place, Skloot makes a point to closely acquaint the reader with the central character, her struggles, the climate of the times, and the way she ultimately viewed her own mortality. Interwoven into this story are elements of racial prejudice and lack of concern by medical staff (especially doctors), a tale of forbidden love between cousins, and the painful and moving story of a woman who has come to accept the fact that her life is at an end. In a way, Skloot works to portray Henrietta higher than her family. This may be the result that this was infact the case; or, it may be the result of the fact that Skloot became so involved in researching, studying about, and writing concerning Henrietta that she necessarily elevated her to a level that did not exist. This is noted in the apparent sense of surprise and shock that Skloot experiences when interviewing Cootie concerning Henrietta’s fate and the cells that survive her. The author juxtaposes this personal story with the fact that HeLa was beginning to experience a great deal of discussion in the media of that time as news articles began to be published. Due to the fact that doctor-patient confidentiality was becoming an issue at the time, the patient was merely referred to in the news stories as Helen L. The author further uses this personal commentary to discuss the grave site of Henrietta. She juxtaposes the fact that the tomb itself is unmarked with the fact that the only remainder of Henrietta still in this world is her children and the cells which have continued to be kept, monitored, and multiplied. Moreover, by examining the situation of the HeLa project from the perspective of legality and the perspective of the family members involved, Skloot is able to bring the topic to the reader in a way that they might not otherwise engage with it. As the dichotomy between the lawyers, the medical professionals, the researchers, and the concerned family members develops, the reader is made aware of the infinite complexities that surround such a issue as that of the bioethical treatment of the cells within the HeLa project. Work Cited Skloot, Rebecca. The immortal life of Henrietta Lacks. New York: Broadway Paperbacks, 2011. Read More