The World Health Organization will celebrate Henrietta Lacks on Wednesday in Geneva for her enduring contribution to medical research, more than 70 years after her cells were removed without her consent during a 1951 hospital visit in Baltimore.
Descendants of Lacks, a Black American, will meet with WHO Director-General Tedros Adhanom Ghebreyesus in Switzerland to honor her legacy and “contribution to groundbreaking achievements in medical research,” according to a statement from the global health organization.
Her cells, which have been replicated billions of times for medical study, have been utilized in the development of the polio vaccine, HIV/AIDS medicines, and advancements in in vitro fertilization.
According to the WHO, the “cells are presently being employed in crucial research for Covid-19 response efforts.”
Lacks, a mother of five, died of cervical cancer in October 1951, at the age of 31, barely eight months after being diagnosed. During a visit to the racially segregated Johns Hopkins Hospital in Baltimore, she complained of vaginal bleeding, which led her doctor to uncover a huge, cancerous growth on her cervix.
During her treatment, a biopsy sample of Lacks’ cancer cells was sent to the tissue lab of George Gey, a cancer researcher who was collecting cells from hospital patients. He discovered that each sample he collected perished quickly.
Lacks’ cells, on the other hand, flourished and doubled every 20 to 24 hours, according to the hospital, making them the first live human cells to survive and proliferate outside the human body.
Lacks’ cells, known medically as “HeLa cells” — from the first two letters of her first and last names — have been utilized and sold by scientists all around the world for decades.
According to the WHO, HeLa cells have contributed to almost 75,000 research and opened the path for breakthroughs in lifesaving vaccinations such as HPV, which protects against cervical cancer, the illness that killed her.
The WHO, on the other hand, noted that her legacy was tinged with “inequity” and expressed optimism that Lacks’ rising worldwide reputation would contribute to “rectifying unfair inequities in global health.”
A life-size bronze statue of Lacks, commissioned by the University of Bristol, was unveiled last week in England in the presence of her children and grandchildren, as part of a separate celebration honoring her during Black History Month.
Last year, the Lacks family celebrated the 100th anniversary of Henrietta Lacks’ birth in Virginia. Her “immortal cells” have also inspired a best-selling novel, an HBO miniseries starring Oprah Winfrey, and family feuds over custody of the cells.
Her descendants filed a lawsuit in federal court in Baltimore earlier this month against a pharmaceutical firm, saying that it benefited off Lacks’ cells without seeking consent from or reimbursement from her family members. In addition, the complaint demands intellectual property connected to the cells.
The family is working with Ben Crump, a civil rights attorney renowned for defending the families of Trayvon Martin and George Floyd, and has spoken out about the “racially unfair medical system” that allowed her cells to be used without her authorization.
Medical racism has a long history in the United States, most famously the Tuskegee experiment, which lasted from 1932 to 1972. In the research, the US Public Health Service collaborated with the Tuskegee Institute in Alabama to follow the spread of untreated syphilis in poor Black males, withholding viable treatments for the illness even after they were available.
Black Americans have been among the worst impacted by covid-19 during the coronavirus epidemic. According to the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention, black individuals in the United States are twice as likely to die and almost three times as likely to be hospitalized with covid as white non-Hispanic adults.
However, some Black people’s skepticism about coronavirus vaccinations has been linked to a pervasive lack of confidence in a medical system that has traditionally dehumanized many.
According to the university, “Johns Hopkins has never sold or profited from the discovery or distribution of HeLa cells and does not hold the rights to the HeLa cell line.” It also stated that there was no defined policy for telling patients or obtaining agreement for specimen-based research at the time, but that it now has “strict patient consent protocols.”
It has also collaborated with members of the Lacks family on programs such as scholarships and symposiums throughout the years, and it has stated that it wants to name a building on its Baltimore campus after Lacks.