The Henrietta Lacks Statue commemorates the unrecognized Black American woman whose immortalized cells enabled the advancement of medical science.
Henrietta Lacks (1920-1951) was born in Roanoke, Virginia, the US, into a family of tobacco farmers. On January 29th, 1951, Lacks, 31 years old and a mother of five, went to Johns Hopkins hospital, the only medical facility in the area that treated black patients, after feeling a “knot” in her womb. She was diagnosed with cervical cancer and started treatment at Johns Hopkins.
Two samples of blood were taken from her cervix, a healthy one and a cancerous one, without her knowledge (which was not required by law in 1950). Lacks died within nine months, but her sample cells continued to live and became the first human cells to survive and multiply outside the human body.
HeLa cells, named after her, became a milestone in modern medicine and enabled the development of some of the most groundbreaking medical treatments and procedures, including the polio vaccine, chemotherapy, IVF, gene-mapping, cloning, and Covid-19 research. Only in 1975 her family learned by chance about Lacks’ non-consensual cells harvest and her contribution to the world.
The University of Bristol commissioned the statue and unveiled it on October 4th, 2021, on the 70th anniversary of the first use of her cells and in the presence of her family members.
The artist Helen Wilson-Roe independently researched the story of Lacks for more than 20 years and created this statue. It is the first statue of a black woman created by a black woman to be installed permanently in a public space in the UK.
While in Bristol, do not miss visiting the Bristol Cathedral, St. Mary Redcliffe church, Brandon Hill Park & Cabot Tower, Bristol Museum and Art Gallery, and the M Shed Museum.
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