She was born Loretta Pleasant on August 1, 1920, to Eliza and Johnny Pleasant in Roanoke, Virginia.  While giving birth to her tenth child, Loretta's mother passed away in 1924.  Unable to raise his children alone, Mr. Pleasant took them all to Clover, Virginia, and distributed them among relatives.

 

At the age of 4, Loretta Pleasant, nicknamed Hennie, was left with her grandfather, Tommy Lacks, who lived in a two-story log cabin that had been the slave quarters of her white great-grandfathers and great uncles' plantation.  She shared a room with a cousin, and her future husband, David "Day" Lacks.  Loretta worked on a tobacco farm, as did most other members of the family while growing up.

 

In 1935, and at age 14, Loretta gave birth to a son, and in 1939 she gave birth to a daughter.  It is not certain when or why Loretta's name became Henrietta, but by the time she and David Lacks married in April of 1941, she was known as Henrietta Lacks.  The couple had three more children and moved to Maryland, in Baltimore Country, where there were more job opportunities.

 

Just four and a half months after the birth of her 5th child, Henrietta went to Johns Hopkins Hospital (the only hospital in the area that treated Black patients) because she felt a knot in her womb.  A biopsy was done, and Lacks was told that she had a malignant epidermoid carcinoma of the cervix.  

​

However, in 1950, physicians found that she had been misdiagnosed, and told her she had adenocarcinoma.  During that time this was a common mistake, and the treatment would have been the same.

 

While being treated at Johns Hopkins Hospital, Dr. George Gey, a physician, and cancer researcher extracted two samples from Lacks' cervix without her permission or knowledge; one sample was of healthy tissue and the other was cancerous. These cells taken from Henrietta Lacks became the infamous HeLa immortal cells. These special cells would not die but continued to multiply over and over repeatedly.  They were given the name HeLa cells, He for Henrietta and La for Lacks, and became a commonly used cell line in contemporary biomedical research.

​

On August 8, 1951, at the age of 31, Henrietta Lacks passed away. An autopsy showed that the cancer had metastasized throughout her entire body.  "Henny" was buried in an unmarked grave in the family cemetery in Lackstorn, in Halifax County, Virginia.
 

It was not until 1973, that the Lacks family learned the truth about the HeLa cell due to researchers wanting to extract DNA from family members.  The National Institute of Health (NIH) analyzed and evaluated the scientific literature involving HeLa cells and found over 110,000 publications that cited the use of HeLa cells between 1953-2018.

     

Henrietta's cells made one of the greatest medical contributions to mankind.  Her cells - taken from a cervical-cancer biopsy - became the first immortal, meaning they could divide again and again and again. This performance can be explained by the expression of an overactive telomerase that rebuild telomeres after each division preventing aging and cellular senescence, and allowing perpetual division of the cells.

​

HeLa cells irrevocably changed the medical landscape and made breakthroughs in the study of herpes, leukemia, influenza, hemophilia, Parkinson's disease, certain types of generic diagnoses, cancer, AIDS, cloning, the effects of radiation and toxic substances, as well as in vitro fertilization.  Some of the research involving HeLa cells also served as the underpinning of several Nobel Prize-winning discoveries. 

​

After many years, and many articles, cd's, documentaries, movies, book, lectures, T.V. programs, along with the song "The Cells That Will Not Die" by Biafra and the Guantanamo School of Medicine, along with a multiplicity of discoveries with the HeLa cells, along with all of the lives the He (Henrietta) La (Lacks) have saved; Henrietta Lacks and her family finally received some portion of the recognition they so amply deserve.

​

She did not know it at the time of her untimely departure, but she has left a trail of wonder that will never be surpassed.  She will live for an eternity.  And since Henrietta's story will never be taught in schools, it is up to parents, grandparents, aunts, uncles, and friends that have a modicum of consciousness to teach this story to all the children in the family.  This is an extraordinary person that has made such a major contribution to the entire world.

 

"Estate of cancer guinea pig Henrietta Lacks sus biotech company for selling her cells in 1951 without her consent in 'racially unjust medical system' after they were used for polio vaccine and countless medical innovations." 

 

 *Civil rights lawyer Ben Crump filed federal lawsuit on behalf of estate of Henrietta Lacks on 70th anniversary of her death on October 4, 1951.

 *Lawsuit accuses $35billion biotech firm Thermo Fisher Scientific of knowingly mass producing and selling Lacks' cloned tissue.

 *Lacks was a 31-year-old mom-of-five who had cells from cervical tumor taken from her without her knowledge or consent at Johns Hopkins Hospital.

 *So-called HeLa cells have been used in countless scientific and medical innovations including development of polio and HPV vaccines.

 *They were found to live indefinitely if fed the correct mixture of nutrients, probably due to high levels of a certain enzyme.

 *Lacks' story was immortalized in a bestselling book and an HBO film with Oprah Winfrey as her daughter."

 

 

Reference : Associated Press and Snejana Farberov for Dailymail.com

Published: 09:55 EST, 4 October 2021 | Updated 16:26 EST,  4 October 2021
 

Wikipedia