Attorneys representing the family of Henrietta Lacks on Tuesday announced a settlement of their lawsuit against Thermo Fisher over the use of cells in scientific research.
The lawsuit demanded the family be paid for the company’s use of Lacks’ cells, which were taken without consent in the 1950s and used in research. Lacks’ cells were biopsied when she visited Johns Hopkins Hospital for treatment of cervical cancer.
Her cells became fundamental to medicineBut Henrietta Lacks’ cells were taken without consent.
Known as HeLa cells, the cells from Lacks’ body led advanced research in wide range of medical fields, including vaccine development, cancer treatments and AIDS research.
Civil rights attorney Ben Crump and attorney Chris Seeger released a statement about the settlement on Tuesday, which would have been Lacks’ 103rd birthday.
“Members of the family of Henrietta Lacks and Thermo Fisher have agreed to settle the litigation filed by Henrietta Lacks’ Estate, in U.S. District Court in Baltimore. The terms of the agreement will be confidential. The parties are pleased that they were able to find a way to resolve this matter outside of Court and will have no further comment about the settlement.
Historic privacy agreement:Federal researchers set privacy agreement for genetics studies based on Henrietta Lacks’ now-famous cancer cells.
How were Henrietta Lacks’ cells obtained?
Lacks, 31, was being treated at Johns Hopkins Hospital in 1951 for cervical cancer when Dr. George Gey collected a sample of tissue on a tumor in her body without her knowledge.
Unlike other cells Gey had worked with, Lacks’ continued to divide and were viable outside her body in test tubes. That allowed researchers to perform tests on them and for the cell line to be shared widely.
The procedure left Lacks infertile, Crump said when the lawsuit was filed in 2021. She died later that year, her family unaware her cells had been taken and used for research until decades later.
Crump described the pain Lacks suffered in the last months of her life as a result of the procedure. While Lacks, he said, was experimented upon, her experiences were similar to many other Black people who have been mistreated in the medical system throughout history.
