The Immortal Cells

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Recommended: Essay that compares and contrasts the way Rebecca Skloot tells Henrietta’s story with how others in the scientific community or media have portrayed Henrietta and her situation

In The Immortal Life of Henrietta Lacks, multiple cell research studies involving Henrietta’s cells are described. Author Rebecca Skloot writes about Henrietta Lacks’ journey through her cervical cancer and how her cells changed the lives of millions long after her death. Skloot relates the history of cell research, including those studies which were successful and those that were not so successful. It is necessary for the author to include the achievements and disturbing practices of scientists throughout this history to inform readers and focus on the way Henrietta’s cells were used. Truth always matters to readers and Henrietta’s family deserves the truth.

Skloot gains credibility by describing researchers who took different approaches to culturing cells. A French surgeon at the Rockefeller Institute named Alexis Carrel grew his “immortal chicken heart.” Many researchers believed it was not possible to have tissues living outside of the body, and Carrel proved them wrong by growing a sliver of chicken-heart tissue in culture successfully. Doctor George Gey was the head of tissue culture research at Johns Hopkins Hospital where Henrietta was treated for her cancer. Dr. Gey, along with his wife, had spent years trying to grow cells outside of the human body in search of the cause and cure for cancer. Most cells they tested either died or hardly grew. In The Immortal Life of Henrietta Lacks, Skloot writes, “The Geys were determined to grow the first immortal human cells: a continuously dividing line of cells all descended from one original sample, cells that would constantly replenish themselves and never die” (30; ch. 3). Little did they know, they were about to grow the first immortal human cells, using cells they removed fro...

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...arch and practices introduced in the book. She brings a sense of clarity for the readers to understand the back-to-back diverse situations she implements. Skloot describes what the family was put through in both not knowing and finding out about Henrietta’s cells, as well as describing the reactions the family had to the situation. She gains credibility by telling about the family’s history involving the different places she visited such as Clover, Virginia where Henrietta was raised, the home-house in which she grew up in, as well as the unmarked grave in which her body lies beneath.

Works Cited

Skloot, Rebecca. The Immortal Life of Henrietta Lacks. (P. 30). New York, NY: Broadway

Publishers, 2010. Print.

Tanner, David E. “The Immortal Life of Henrietta Lacks.” Journal of Popular Culture 43.4

(2010): 916—918. Academic Search Complete. Web. 26 Feb. 2012.

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