The Unwilling Pioneer With an Unstoppable Impact
The Biotech Briefing
Over the last month, a lawsuit has been under way for the family of a woman that died over 70 years ago. The family is suing Thermo Fisher Scientific, one of the biggest players in the life science industry, for the commercial use of a cell culture obtained from a biopsy of the woman's cervical cancer. Yes, they have been using this same woman's cells for the last 70 years.
This might be the only great thing about cancer. Unlike most cells in your body, cancer cells are in a constant state of multiplying, which makes them handy to use in medical and biological research. Instead of constantly having to sample out tissue from people, you just need a few of this woman's cancer cells, give them some food and let them do their thing.
In this woman's case, the cell culture multiplied so well that scientists went slightly overboard with using it. Specifically, over the last 70 years, it has been used in over 110,000 scientific publications; ranging from studying how various therapeutics, hormones and toxins affect the growth of cancer cells, developing vaccines for polio and covid, as well as drugs to prevent the spread of HIV. The cells were even sent to the International Space Station to study how radiation in space affects human cell biology.
The reason why this lawsuit is so interesting is that we definitely know where this specific cell culture came from, and we also know that the patient never consented to having her cells used. The patient's name is Henrietta Lacks, and the cells were even given their name after her: HeLa.
While there is no way to deny that these cells belonged to Henrietta, and that because of her, Thermo fisher, and many other companies made a fortune in both the pharmaceutical and biotechnological industry, there is still a big ongoing debate over whether the family deserves a share of the profits.
What do you think?