who is she

WHO IS SHE
(in my blog yesterday the link to facebook where you could find
out if you were russian botted was down
it now is working
here is the link to the blog)


npr.com

this is henrietta lacks
the mother of research

she a poor women went to john hopkins complaining of
bleeding
it was discovered she had cervical cancer

some of her cancer cells were harvested
to use in research
the immortal line of cells were and are called hela cell line
named after her initials

these hela cells were used in finding a vaccine for polio
in aids research cancer research and research on
flu hemophilia leukemia etc

probably if you did cancer or viral research in a university
for the last upteen years
you used her hela cells to do it

they were used all over the world

her legacy
her cancer that killed her
has saved thousands if not millions of folks lives

when i went to university of texas southwerstern and later
to ucla
there were a stack of papers i had to sign
giving them permission to use my dna my rna my blood
my spinal fluid my scans for research
without any limitations
if some university or company makes a drug from that information
gained from my cell lines or dna etc
i agree that i dont get nothing from it

i knew that when i started
i understood
i signed those releases

these didnt exist when her cells were harvested

the problem was this poor black lady with no insurance
had no idea her cervical cancer cells were harvested
to be used for research

her family wasnt told until years later
she never knew they were used


there is a book about her life
the immortal life of henrietta lacks
i read it


there is an hbo movie about her life
called
the immortal life of henrietta lacks

the picture above is a portrait that hangs in the
in washington at the Smithsonian national portrait gallery

she is smiling which she apparently always did
she was religious thus the bible
the pattern in the dress and surrounding her represents her
hela cell line
there are two buttons missing on her dress which represents
those cancer cells that were taken and used without
her permission

if you havent read her story or seen it in the movie
maybe you should

she saved a lot of lives
because of her all our medical privacy is now protected

she is deserving of this portrait

here is a link to nprs article on her
here is a link to wikipedia on her

the organicgreen doctor