The legacy of Henrietta Lacks, health research ethics and Immortal Cell Lines

In 1951, Henrietta Lacks was treated for aggressive cervical cancer at Johns Hopkins Hospital in Baltimore. She was admitted to the hospital’s segregated “coloured” ward, where a small sample of her tumour cells was taken without her knowledge or consent. Those cells, later named HeLa after the first letters of her first and last names, displayed a unique property: they could survive and divide indefinitely, and was identified as the first immortal human cell line.

HeLa cells have since been a cornerstone of biomedical research. They helped develop the polio vaccine, advanced cancer and fertility research, contributed to gene mapping, and supported studies of viruses such as HIV and COVID-19. Scientists even sent HeLa cells into space to study how human tissue responds to zero gravity. Their ability to multiply endlessly transformed laboratory research worldwide, yet the human story behind these cells remained largely invisible for decades.

The same traits that made HeLa cells invaluable reflected the severity of Henrietta’s illness. She passed on months after her diagnosis, and was buried in an unmarked grave. Her family had no knowledge of the widespread use or commercialisation of her cells. Some early experiments using HeLa cells were ethically troubling: in the 1950s and 60s, researchers injected the cells into prisoners without consent, and years later the Lacks family gave blood samples under the mistaken belief that they were being tested for hereditary cancer. Public disclosure of Henrietta’s identity also exposed parts of her genome, raising privacy concerns for her descendants.

In 2021, the Lacks estate filed a lawsuit against Thermo Fisher Scientific, claiming the company had profited from HeLa cells without permission. The case was settled in 2023, with lawyers maintaining that the statute of limitations should not apply because “every time they regenerate or profit off of Henrietta Lacks’ genetic materials… [it] starts the statute of limitations to accrue again.”

Recognition of Lacks’s contribution has grown in recent years. In 2021, the World Health Organisation held a ceremony honouring her life and legacy. “What happened to Henrietta was wrong,” said WHO Director-General Tedros Adhanom Ghebreyesus. “She is one of many women of colour whose bodies have been misused by science". Earlier this year, a group of US senators introduced a bill to posthumously award Henrietta Lacks the Congressional Gold Medal. “Henrietta Lacks changed the course of modern medicine,” said Senator Chris Van Hollen. “It is long past time that we recognise her life-saving contributions to the world.” More than seventy years after her death, Henrietta Lacks’s cells continue to multiply — a scientific marvel and a reminder of the human story at the heart of discovery.

The story of Henrietta Lacks raises vital ethical questions about biomedical research. Today, her legacy is visible not only in laboratories but also in policy debates around donor rights, research transparency and equity in science.