Bring on the tough stuff - there’s not just one right answer.
- What are HeLa cells? Why are they so important to medical science?
- Why were the Lackses so upset when they first heard about HeLa cells?
- How has the idea of "informed consent" changed since Henrietta's day?
- How does learning more about their mother and sister help Henrietta's children? In what ways does it hurt them?
- What kinds of innovations have come about because of HeLa cells? In terms of ethics? Technologies?
- What is the relationship between race and science in this work?
- What is eugenics? How does it play into the story of cell culture?
- Why does Skloot bring up the Tuskegee Institute syphilis studies? What issues were raised from those experiments?
- How does Elsie's experience at Crownsville explicate some of Skloot's primary themes in this work?
- Does the Lacks family have a satisfactory outcome after their decades of struggling with the HeLa industry? What does "satisfactory" look like for them?
- Do poor people today have better access to health care than in 1951?
- Would you let a doctor use your skin cancer cells for skin cancer research? How about for cosmetic surgery research?