The relatives retained the civil rights attorney to sue Big Pharma for the fortunes that were made from Henrietta’s famous cancer cells.
In a press release Sunday for Henrietta Lacks’ 101st birthday, her family announced they would honor her life and legacy with the advancement of HELA100. A family-led initiative, HELA100 was established to educate future generations on the impact of her HeLa cells while promoting equity and social justice.
To add to it, the Lacks family has hired Benjamin Crump, the prominent civil rights attorney who will seek compensation for them from big pharmaceutical companies for making fortunes off medical research from Henrietta Lacks’ famous cancer cells. Crump’s legal team is investigating lawsuits against as many as 100 defendants and haven’t ruled out a case against the John Hopkins Hospital.
For those who are unaware of the history, a Hopkins doctor collected a sample of cancer cells from Henrietta Lacks, when she was a young mother, without her knowledge or permission nearly 70 years ago. Dubbed the “HeLa” cells, they were the first to live outside the body in a glass tube and have been used to develop everything from COVID-19 vaccines to sunscreen to in vitro fertilization. Crump said it is a continued example of “the long and troubling history of the medical exploitation of Black people in America.”
Her name became internationally known after Rebecca Skloot’s best-selling book, The Immortal Life of Henrietta Lacks, and the HBO film starring Oprah Winfrey, came out to the public.
The Lacks family learned of the reproduction of Henrietta’s cells in 1975 and have never been financially compensated while trillions of dollars have been made with her involuntary contribution. Bioethicists have said taking cells without a patient’s permission was commonly done in those days. When Henrietta passed away in 1951 at the age of 31 from an aggressive strain of cervical cancer, her death helped to establish The Common Rule, which is an ethical standard for informed patient consent in the medical community.
If any aspect of a patient’s medical case is used for research, then a code number must be assigned to establish anonymity and accountability.
“The American pharmaceutical community has a shameful history of profiting off research at the expense of Black people without their knowledge, consent, or benefit, leading to mass profits for pharmaceutical companies from our illnesses and our very bodies,” Attorney Crump said during a press conference last week. “There is no clearer example of this than Henrietta Lacks and the seemingly endless manipulation of her genetic material. The pharmaceutical companies have been unjustly enriched by this unethical taking of her cells, while Henrietta Lacks’ family has never been afforded any equity.”
“As we honor our Hennie’s 101st birthday, we remain united towards educating the next generation on the impact of her HeLa cells, advancing equity to access the breakthroughs that her HeLa cells created, and seeking justice for Henrietta Lacks,” Alfred Lacks Carter, the grandson of Henrietta, said at the Birthday CELLebration.
Since the launch of HELA100 in August 2020, the program has educated more than 20,000 students, advocates, researchers, patients, health care providers, policymakers, and leaders. In addition, the signing of the Henrietta Lacks Enhancing Cancer Research Act into law helps to ensure that all people have more equitable access to potentially lifesaving advances in cancer treatment.
“The Lacks Family is taking action towards a more just world, and we want everyone to say my grandmother’s name—Henrietta Lacks. She has done a lot for the world and needs to be recognized for what she has done,” said Alan Wilks, the grandson of Henrietta Lacks.
“There are family members that are young and impressionable. They need to know that every life matters—Black lives do matter,” Wilks said. “This has been a long time overdue.”“This is the greatest example of corporate theft I’ve seen in my career, and I’ve been pursuing pharmaceutical companies for 25 years,” said New York-based trial lawyer Christopher Seeger, who is also representing the Lacks family.
“They took something from this family and have offered them nothing, yet they’ve gone out and made millions of dollars.”
