The Demon in the Freezer by Richard Preston, Hela Cells & Henrietta Lacks
When I was commenting on the book Gravity by Tess Gerritsen, I mentioned that I find plague/epidemic/pandemic stories very interesting.
The second book that I've read on my Kindle has been The Demon in the Freezer, a book by Richard Preston that is ostensibly about the eradication of smallpox ... the problem is that the author very awkwardly shoehorned the 9/11 attacks and the anthrax letter incidents into the book.
The book should primarily have been an account of the Smallpox Eradication Program (1967-80), the ongoing perception by the U.S. government that smallpox is still a potential bioterrorism agent, and the controversy over whether or not the remaining samples of smallpox virus in Atlanta and Moscow (the "demon" in the freezer) should be finally destroyed. If Preston had just focussed on smallpox, the book would have been a lot better than it ended up being. As it was, the smallpox sections were quite gripping and the anthrax sections, very forced. Furthermore, Preston is much better at describing the build-up to disasters. He's really very terrible at describing people, their clothes and their manners in "normal", non-disaster scenes. Furthermore, the ending fizzles out very unspectacularly and I'll never read a book by this author again.
Given how rather poorly written the book was, tne of the things that caught my interest in the book, was the discussion of the "HeLa cell line". Apparently, one of the most widely used continuous cell lines for virology is the HeLa cell line. The cells were derived in 1951 from a woman named Henrietta Lacks.
In 1951, Henrietta Lacks, a 31-year old mother of five children, was diagnosed as having a malignant tumor of the cervix. She was examined at Johns Hopkins Hospital in Baltimore. A sample of the tumour was removed and provided to a Dr. George Gey a man who had been attempting to produce a line of immortal human cells for some years. When Ms. Lacks died in October 1951, Dr. Gey announced on national television that he had produced from Ms. Lacks’ tumour a line of cells that propagated as no other cells ever had before. He called them "Hela". cells in her honor, and showed a vial of the cells to the television audience.
Apparently HeLa cells have since been used in many laboratories all over the world to make countless research discoveries. After Dr. Gey announced the HeLa cell line, it was used to propagate poliovirus, an event that played an important role in the development of poliovirus vaccines. Although the HeLa cells were lauded - Dr. Gey propagated them without Lacks' knowledge or permission. Neither Lacks nor her family gave permission.
Apparently the reason that the HeLa cells are called "immortal" is that they can divide an unlimited number of times in a laboratory cell culture plate as long as fundamental cell survival conditions are met (i.e. being maintained and sustained in a suitable environment). Wikipedia says: "There are many strains of HeLa cells as they continue to evolve by being grown in cell cultures, but all HeLa cells are descended from the same tumour cells removed from Ms. Lacks. It has been estimated that the total number of HeLa cells that have been propagated in cell culture far exceeds the total number of cells that were actually in Henrietta Lacks' body."
There's a fascinating article about Henrietta Lacks and her cells here, the wikipedia article about Henrietta Lacks is here and there are also many articles can be found if you do a Google search for hela + lacks.
The lack of consent issue bothers me quite a bit, although I suppose the benefits to humanity outweigh that?
The second book that I've read on my Kindle has been The Demon in the Freezer, a book by Richard Preston that is ostensibly about the eradication of smallpox ... the problem is that the author very awkwardly shoehorned the 9/11 attacks and the anthrax letter incidents into the book.
The book should primarily have been an account of the Smallpox Eradication Program (1967-80), the ongoing perception by the U.S. government that smallpox is still a potential bioterrorism agent, and the controversy over whether or not the remaining samples of smallpox virus in Atlanta and Moscow (the "demon" in the freezer) should be finally destroyed. If Preston had just focussed on smallpox, the book would have been a lot better than it ended up being. As it was, the smallpox sections were quite gripping and the anthrax sections, very forced. Furthermore, Preston is much better at describing the build-up to disasters. He's really very terrible at describing people, their clothes and their manners in "normal", non-disaster scenes. Furthermore, the ending fizzles out very unspectacularly and I'll never read a book by this author again.
Given how rather poorly written the book was, tne of the things that caught my interest in the book, was the discussion of the "HeLa cell line". Apparently, one of the most widely used continuous cell lines for virology is the HeLa cell line. The cells were derived in 1951 from a woman named Henrietta Lacks.
In 1951, Henrietta Lacks, a 31-year old mother of five children, was diagnosed as having a malignant tumor of the cervix. She was examined at Johns Hopkins Hospital in Baltimore. A sample of the tumour was removed and provided to a Dr. George Gey a man who had been attempting to produce a line of immortal human cells for some years. When Ms. Lacks died in October 1951, Dr. Gey announced on national television that he had produced from Ms. Lacks’ tumour a line of cells that propagated as no other cells ever had before. He called them "Hela". cells in her honor, and showed a vial of the cells to the television audience.
Apparently HeLa cells have since been used in many laboratories all over the world to make countless research discoveries. After Dr. Gey announced the HeLa cell line, it was used to propagate poliovirus, an event that played an important role in the development of poliovirus vaccines. Although the HeLa cells were lauded - Dr. Gey propagated them without Lacks' knowledge or permission. Neither Lacks nor her family gave permission.
Apparently the reason that the HeLa cells are called "immortal" is that they can divide an unlimited number of times in a laboratory cell culture plate as long as fundamental cell survival conditions are met (i.e. being maintained and sustained in a suitable environment). Wikipedia says: "There are many strains of HeLa cells as they continue to evolve by being grown in cell cultures, but all HeLa cells are descended from the same tumour cells removed from Ms. Lacks. It has been estimated that the total number of HeLa cells that have been propagated in cell culture far exceeds the total number of cells that were actually in Henrietta Lacks' body."
There's a fascinating article about Henrietta Lacks and her cells here, the wikipedia article about Henrietta Lacks is here and there are also many articles can be found if you do a Google search for hela + lacks.
The lack of consent issue bothers me quite a bit, although I suppose the benefits to humanity outweigh that?