i say/they say essay about book argument

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Humanities

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Book - Imortal life on henritta lacks
Info - use one of the arguments made by Rebbeca skloot as a "springboard"for your own argument about mdeical ethics. Using the principles and mehtods of theysay/isay, summarize one of the arguments made in the springboard text, suporting it with evidence from the text(They say portion). Then take position on that argument which you will support with texts you find or personal expirence. (I say portion)
- 6 pages

ive done half of it but my teacher says to remember that you are suppose to be making an argument on one of skloots argument (Maybe you can fix that)

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Alexis Molina Ms. Denninger AP Lang and Comp 4/17/17 Henrietta’s Cells Fairness and consent play a big role in medicine. A patient must be treated fairly and must give consent in order for treatment or surgery to be done. If a patient chooses to not give consent, in any situation further actions are never taken or are considered. Consent was broken when Henrietta Lacks’ cells were taken away from her. Henrietta was an African American woman who was born in Maryland; she was a very hard-working tobacco farmer. Unfortunately in her 30s she was diagnosed with cervical cancer and then passed away in Hopkins hospital. During the time of her death no such laws were yet to be implemented into the system regarding consent from a patient. The doctors basically took advantage of that and stole a sample of henrietta's cells. The actions that were taken were form of misdoing, a misdoing that now would never be allowed during this time. The doctors should have never taken the cells away from Henrietta because no consent was given from her and her family was unaware of such actions during her death. In the Book The immortal life of henrietta Lacks there are many arguments that are discussed, but the argument that is more central in the whole book relates to the stealing of henrietta's cells and how her family was never told about the actions that were taken from the doctors that had treated Henrietta at the time of her death. This story has a big discussion about the rights a person has and how people were given vaccines with henrietta cells without their knowledge. The birth of HeLa cells began when Doctor Gey (The doctor who treated Henrietta) found out that the sample of cells he acquired from Henrietta during a treatment were immortal. When Henrietta cells were siting in his lab Henrietta's cells were being to grow and replicate. Gey knew this was out of the ordinary. After Henrietta's death he was eager to get more samples of Henrietta's cells because he knew that the cells weren't like any other cell they were immortal. The book stated “Gey wanted samples from as many organs in her body as possible, to see if they’d grow like Hela (the cells that were taken at first).” This concluded that he was very eager to take more samples from Henrietta, but he needed permission from Henrietta's husband. Doctor Gey never got permission. During the 1950s “Though no law or code of ethic required doctors to ask permission before taking tissue from a living patient, the law made it very clear that performing an autopsy or removing tissue from the dead without permission was illegal” Without acknowledging consent Gey continued on what he had planned and called his assistant Mary to help collect samples from henrietta. More samples of Henrietta cells were then stolen. After all this occurred, not long after the death of Lacks “Planning began for a HeLa factory- a massive operation that would grow to produce trillions of HeLa cells each week. It was build for one reason: to help stop polio”. As Hela Grew through the United states “a virologist named Chest Southam had a frightening thought: what if Henrietta’s cancer cells could infect the scientists working on the?” He continued to work on this theory and He first began to inject a woman who had Leukemia with 5 million of Henrietta’s cells and also injected many of his other cancer patients telling them that it the injection that was given to them was to check their immune system. After seeing horrible results the book stated that “Within hours, the patient's forearms grew red and swollen. Five to ten days later, hard nodules began growing at the injection sites.…he removed them but the nodules always came”. He then continued and tested patients that were healthy, the ohio state inmates were the one of the many that volunteered. He proceeded with his test and The results were horrifying soon the prisoner's arms started to become infected, Tumors even grew on the inmate's arms. The effects were very similar to the patients that had cancer. Southam ended up injecting many people, “He also began injecting Henrietta's cells into every gynecologic surgery patient who came to Sloan-Kettering memorial Hospital”. Southam would say that “If he explained anything,he would simply said he was testing them for cancer”.
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Explanation & Answer

Attached.

Running head: THE IMMORTAL LIFE OF HENRIETTA LACKS

The Immortal Life of Henrietta Lacks
Student’s Name:
Institutional Affiliation:

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THE IMMORTAL LIFE OF HENRIETTA LACKS

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The Immortal Life of Henrietta Lacks

Summary
Chapter 17 of the book The Immortal Life of Henrietta Lacks talks about the illegal,
immoral and deplorable practices of doctors and scientists regarding testing cancer cells in
patients without their knowledge. It was Chester Southam, a renowned virologist who started to
wonder if the HeLa cells could infect the scientists who handled them. It is then that he decided
to test his theories through infecting a sick lady with Henrietta’s cells. This action was
committed without the knowledge of the sick woman. Also, Southam did a similar procedure to
other patients without their knowledge about the nature of the substance they were being
injected. After numerous injections, Southam was curious to know if anything grew (Skloot,
2010). To confirm his theories, the cells grew on the injected persons. However, we able to
remove the resulting cancerous growths in all individuals, but four cases. It was in these four
cases that cancer had returned.
Technically, scientists during the time of Southam were not worried about the
consequences of such actions, since the US did not have laws that dictate violation of some
human rights regarding scientific research. The period was technical with more violation of
patient rights leading to many people being infected with cancerous cells without their
knowledge. It was even sarcastic that people who questioned much about such injections were
regarded as individuals who objected scientific research (Skloot, 2010). Also, many people
during the time of Southam were too ignorant to understand the essentiality of study as well as
the content of the injections made to them. Most of them only thought it was meant to ensure
scientists enhanced their findings without causing harm to their bodies. Unfortunately, it was not
the case for practices practiced by scientists such as Southam.

THE IMMORTAL LIFE OF HENRIETTA LACKS

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Thesis
The story on the Immortal Life of Henrietta lacks, particularly of chapter 17 explains the
dark days within the medical sector in the mid-20th century in the United States. Issues of evil
ethical practices within the health sector and scientific research are told to have been largely
characterized during this time. Similar to the days of Nazi influence and control in Germany
during the reign of Adolf Hitler, scientists such as Southam inflicted pain, anguish and suffering
to many innocent people. It is through injection of cancerous cells that can be compared to the
actions of Nazis on Jews, where innocent people had their lives put at risk for selfish and curious
desires of few individuals.
The action of scientists as portrayed in chapter 17 portrays how individuals in position of
crucial research can negatively use their positions to inflict pain and suffering, as well as cause
death to innocent individuals. Understanding how the cancer cells of Henrietta were used from
the start of the book to the last bit of the story that follows clearly demonstrates negative side of
scientific research. For instance, the cells were taken from Henrietta’s body without permission
from her or her family. Also, her family members would only learn about the sample cancer cells
through the accidental situation. Furthermore, the scientists investigating on the cells decided to
test it on innocent people without their prior knowledge. It is these actions that clearly portray
the dark part of scientific research in the mid-20th century.

Argumentative Illustration Essay
The book Immortal Life of Henrietta Lacks by Rebecca Skloot tells the story of Henrietta
Lacks, who was an African-American woman who had died of cervical cancer. The story told in
this book covers the sample of cancer cells that were retrieved from Henrietta’s body. The story
also covers the life of Henrietta’s family, which she left behind after her demise. Based on the

THE IMMORTAL LIFE OF HENRIETTA LACKS

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story, neither Hernietta nor her husband and family members knew about the tissue sample that
was taken from her for lab...


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