Goose Thoughts.

On page 133 they mention a cancer doctor from Sweden that the New York Times wrote about with the headline “Sweden Penalizes Cancer Specialist”. The specialist was giving himself and patients injections of the HeLa cells. I think it’s strange that someone could get away with something strange like that for so long.

https://www.google.com/amp/s/amp.cnn.com/cnn/2015/07/10/us/michigan-cancer-doctor-sentenced/index.html

However, in this article exactly this happened. In Detroit Michigan a doctor did something similar to this. The doctor was caught giving patients cancer treatments when people did not even have cancer. While the one mentioned in the book only got a penalty, this doctor was sentenced to 45 years in prison. This makes sense due to the fact that giving healthy people cancer treatments can cause a lot of health problems. Over all the similarity is uncanny and is terrible that people think it’s ok to do this.

On page 38 they introduce a scientist working at Johns Hopkins named George Gey. He was a Do-it-yourselfer similar to someone on Pinterest or HGTV. Gey was a Pittsburgh native and an alumni of University of Pittsburgh, even though he had to take off years working to pay to finish his degree. After graduating Gey set up a lab in a janitors closet at Johns Hopkins and studied cells, and prior to his lab in Johns Hopkins, recorded living cells through a microscope.

https://www.google.com/amp/s/www.nytimes.com/2019/07/03/science/cancer-bacteria-immune-system.amp.html

Gey’s history of recording living cells reminds me of all the constant cancer research being discovered today. In this article, scientists have reprogrammed bacteria to kill cancer cells in mice. This success with mice have left scientists optimistic for the future with hopes of finally being able to efficiently kill cancer cells. The interesting thing about the bacteria is that after some time they eventually just kill themselves and the scientists have seen over 90% of the bacteria simply exploding and producing Nanobodies that attach to cancer cells and allow other bacteria to see them. This new breakthrough in cancer research is promising but still needs more testing to see actual use.

It’s no secret that celebrities and people of influence are constantly in the eye of the public and often find it hard to get some privacy. On page 8 Deborah recalls times that when she visits the doctor she often says her mother was HeLa. She addresses her as HeLa because that’s what everyone knows her as; just the abbreviation for Henrietta Lacks. She also explains that people often ask her if she’s the daughter of Henrietta Lacks and that it hard for her to get away from it.

https://www.google.com/amp/s/people.com/celebrity/growing-up-famous-parents/amp/

In this article by people magazine relatives of famous stars often recall similar things such as people always recognizing them from their family. They also talk about not getting out of the eyes of the public most of the time. I think it’s odd to think that their relatives are well known for completely different reasons yet they still save the same issues.

It’s no secret that celebrities and people of influence are constantly in the eye of the public and often find it hard to get some privacy. On page 8 Deborah recalls times that when she visits the doctor she often says her mother was HeLa. She addresses her as HeLa because that’s what everyone knows her as; just the abbreviation for Henrietta Lacks. She also explains that people often ask her if she’s the daughter of Henrietta Lacks and that it hard for her to get away from it.

https://www.google.com/amp/s/people.com/celebrity/growing-up-famous-parents/amp/

In this article by people magazine relatives of famous stars often recall similar things such as people always recognizing them from their family. They also talk about not getting out of the eyes of the public most of the time. I think it’s odd to think that their relatives are well known for completely different reasons yet they still save the same issues.

on page 40 another rhetorical move of hope is shown in the story. After Henrietta goes into the hospital and is getting her cancer treated through sewing radium onto it to kill the cancer cells, the doctor takes a sample of her cells for testing. Over in the lab made by George Gey to try and grow cells his assistant Mary took the samples, cut them into smaller pieces, and proceeded to give the cells nutrients and place them in the incubator. Having done this hundreds of time and never seeing success she had low hopes but was surprised to see that the cells “Were growing like crabgrass.”

The second topic that I want to talk about is Hopefulness. On page 31 Henrietta goes back to the doctor for medicine and treatment. The specific quote is when Henrietta says “Ain’t nothin serious wrong - Doctor’s gonna fix me right up”. This part shows her hopefulness turned to a kind of confidence where she believes that her cancer isn’t anything bad and it will pass like it is the flu. 

while reading the book, one page 7 the author is setting up the story and how she met Deborah Lacks. Deborah goes on to explain that Henrietta’s soul goes on to live on through her cells and basically she can’t be dead until all of her cells are dead. Deborah goes on to use an editor who tried to get the Lacks’ name out of the book mysteriously dying as an example of Henrietta getting “Pissed off” and causing that to happen to the editor. this makes me think of the abstract topic of family relationships because Deborah is sort of defending her family after her cells were used for science without consent.