AllTheShips

Deborah Lacks, Henrietta’s fourth born child, learns about her mother’s history in 1973, well after she should’ve. From thereafter she proceeds to investigate her older sister, Elsie.
          	Elsie was Henrietta’s second born child. She was institutionalized because of being diagnosed with epilepsy, and the family received news of her death when she was only 15 years old. Further research by Deborah and the author of this book, Rebecca Skloot, proves that Elsie’s death wasn’t just because of her condition. Her death certificate had reports of ‘respiratory failure’, ‘epilepsy’, ‘cerebral palsy’ and more. The Hospital for the Negro Insane was where she was being kept for five years before she died there, and conditions were overcrowded with about one doctor per 225 patients. The hospital ‘lost’ more patients than they discharged. 
          	Racial injustice. Medicine. scientific discovery. Henrietta Lacks deserves to be known. Spread her story.
          	The Immortal Life of Henrietta Lacks, by Rebecca Skloot
          
          sorry, it cut short.

I want you all to listen to this. 
          (This summary is my writing. Source: The Immortal Life of Henrietta Lacks)
          
          Henrietta Lacks, a poor black woman, was diagnosed with Cervical Cancer in 1951. Doctors working in Johns Hopkins Hospital took some of her cells- without her permission or knowledge- and she died due to failure of treatment in 1951. Shortly before her death, George Gey, the lead tissue-culture researcher at Johns Hopkins, successfully managed to culture the first immortal human cell line using the cells from Henrietta's cervix. Scientists then started mass-producing her cells- which they dubbed ‘HeLa’.
          	HeLa then became one of the most important medical tools in history- their uses going from helping create cures and vaccines-the polio vaccine among them- to developing cloning and gene mapping. Henrietta’s cells have been bought, sold, and transacted so many times, but very rarely the buyers or sellers know where HeLa cells came from, or who Henrietta Lacks is. 
          	Despite the value her cells have, Henrietta’s family receives no profit from her cells and can barely afford health insurance.

It cracks me up that you don't write books on this, after the four of us (or five if you include Widico) wrote POD and TDF.