How the ‘Groundbreaking’ Henrietta Lacks Settlement Could Change Research

August 3, 2023

(Nature) – Earlier this week, the biotechnology company Thermo Fisher Scientific reached a settlement with the family of Henrietta Lacks, a Black woman who had cells taken from her without consent more than 70 years ago. The cervical cancer cells, removed during Lacks’s treatment at Johns Hopkins Hospital in Baltimore, Maryland, were shared widely because of their ability to survive and divide indefinitely in the laboratory — and have led to numerous scientific discoveries. Eventually, they made their way into the hands of companies such as Thermo Fisher in Waltham, Massachusetts, which sells products derived from the cells.

The settlement, which remains confidential, comes after years of research institutions and biologists grappling with how to use the cells ethically while also giving the Lacks family agency over them. Nature spoke to legal specialists and researchers about what this settlement might mean for the scientific community, as well as for future litigation. (Read More)