Research Question: Has the history of Medical Science been built on the foundation of unethical medical research/ experimentation on African Americans?
Summary: A woman in 1950 was dying of cervical cancer. Doctors treated her but she soon died because the cancer spread to fast for the doctors to treat. After she passed doctors took tissue samples of her tumors and cultured them in a lab producing the first immortal cell line. All of this was done without her permission. Rebecca Skloot uses the book to portray how much Henrietta's cells have given to science, but yet no one knows who she was. Her cells have contributed to the invention of the polio vaccine, antibiotics for multiple infections, prescriptions for HIV and much more. Because scientist obtained the material without her permission some like to consider it unethical.
I will be using this book as another reference to help support my research establishing that the history of medicine has been built on the back of blacks. This book is helping me establish the effects of unethical medical research on African Americans and their familes.
Skloot, Rebecca. The Immortal Life of Henrietta Lack. New York: Broadway Books, 2010. Print
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