Modern Times the Way of All Flesh

The Way of All Flesh tells the story of Henrietta Lacks, the woman who will never die . In 1951 she died of cancer.Before her death cells were removed from her body and cultivated in a laboratory in the hope that they could help find a cure for cancer. The cells (HeLa) have been growing ever since, and the scientists found that they were growing in ways they could not control. It received the 1997 Golden Gate Award. In 1998, Modern Times: The Way of All Flesh , the documentary on Mrs. Lacks and HeLa directed by Adam Curtis, won the Best Science and Nature Documentary at the San Francisco International Film Festival. Immediately following this film s airing in 1997, an article on HeLa, Mrs. Lacks, and her family was published by reporter Jacques Kelly in the Baltimore Sun. Since the 1950s news on Mrs. Lacks and on HeLa has been and continues to be published throughout the world in newspapers, magazines, and in scientific journals, books, and other academic publications. In the 1990s the Dundalk Eagle published the first article on her in a newspaper in Baltimore City and Baltimore County, and it continues to announce upcoming local commemorative activities. The Lacks family was also honored at the Smithsonian Institution. In 2001 it was announced that the National Foundation for Cancer Research would be honoring the late Henrietta Lacks for the contributions made to cancer research and modern medicine on September 14th. Because of the events of September 11, 2001 the date for honoring her was changed. Henrietta Lacks HeLa cells has been recognized as an important ongoing resource to science, research, medicine and public health. According to reporter Michael Rogers, the subsequent development of HeLa by a researcher at the hospital, helped answer the demands of 10,000 who marched for a cure to polio just a few days before. By 1954 HeLa was used by Jonas Salk to develop a vaccine for polio. As stated by reporter Van Smith in 2002 a demand for HeLa quickly rose ... the cells were put into mass production and traveled around the globe--even into space, on an unmanned satellite to determine whether human tissues could survive zero gravity . Reporter Smith continued, In the half-century since Henrietta Lacks death, her ... cells ... have continually been used for research into cancer, AIDS, the effects of radiation and toxic substances, gene mapping, and countless other scientific pursuits . HeLa was used to test human sensitivity to tape, glue cosmetics, and many other products.