Posted on 08/02/2023 2:42:06 PM PDT by RandFan
Laboratory equipment maker Thermo Fisher Scientific has settled a lawsuit brought by the estate of Henrietta Lacks, a long-deceased cancer victim whose “immortal” cells have lived on to fuel biomedical research for decades, lawyers for the estate have said.
The story of Lacks, a young African American woman who died in Baltimore in 1951, was made famous in Rebecca Skloot’s 2010 book The Immortal Life of Henrietta Lacks, which became a movie in 2017 featuring Oprah Winfrey.
The HeLa cell line, the first to survive and reproduce indefinitely in lab conditions, has been cultivated in vast quantities and used in a range of medical research worldwide, including to test the polio vaccine, research the effects of radiation on human cells, and develop a treatment for sickle-cell anaemia.
The tissue sample that became the HeLa cell line was cut from Lacks’ cervix at Johns Hopkins hospital in Baltimore without her knowledge during surgery to treat her cervical cancer. Lacks died of the disease at age 31. Since then, it is estimated, 50m tonnes of her cells have been produced.
Lacks’ estate sued Thermo Fisher in Baltimore federal court in 2021, asserting her family had “not seen a dime” of money that Thermo Fisher made from cultivating the HeLa line of cells that originated from tissue taken without Lacks’ consent during a medical procedure in 1951.
The terms of the agreement were confidential. Thermo Fisher and the estate’s attorneys, Ben Crump and Chris Seeger, said in a statement that they were pleased with the settlement.
(Excerpt) Read more at theguardian.com ...
I have to live forever in a liberal world?
Help me!
When I was growing up (and very interested in cancer research) I read they were cultured from a woman named Helen Lane.
That’s what I was told when I was in undergraduate school.
But Henrietta Lacks is correct!
Helen Lane was a pseudonym...mentioned in the link I just posted.
Strange. I wonder why they kept her real name under wraps.
Her cell line crossed paths with me when I was working on BioMEMS devices.
I still have my all stock certificates.
$7.43 worth...
Like "Jane Roe" of Row v. Wade "fame."
Perhaps that was a pseudonym used to protect her survivors’ privacy . . . and to hide the cell line’s source. And if the shyster Benjamin Crump is “pleased with the outcome” you can be sure many, many millions of dollars changed hands.
Some of the family wasn’t happy with Oprah and her movie ($$$) either. They did deserve money for the use if their loved one’s cells, though.
Benjamin Crump *spit*
Put Lee back...
Lacks’ estate sued Thermo Fisher in Baltimore federal court in 2021, asserting her family had “not seen a dime” of money that Thermo Fisher made from cultivating the HeLa line of cells that originated from tissue taken without Lacks’ consent during a medical procedure in 1951. If she was having surgery, wouldn't she have signed some sort of document before hand? Wouldn't the doctors explain what would be done during the procedure? Did she say, ok let's get it over with? Crump is literally the smelly skidmark on America's underwear, and is a poster child for tougher standards for passing the bar exam.
“And if the shyster Benjamin Crump is “pleased with the outcome” you can be sure many, many millions of dollars changed hands.”
And the family will only get pennies on the dollar out of the settlement.
I always found this story of her “living” forever in this way very creepy, and Helen Lane was what I’d first heard. The fact that it was an African American woman is what made it a cause celebre. Oprah and Crump would not have cared less for a white family.
The question is were they able to find the surgical consent form, if it existed, years later??????
The hospital records would be on microfilm
Nobody worried about tissues in those days.
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