Great article @liberosist. In a sense the harvesting of cells from Henrietta Lacks may be an expression of the dark early days of cancer research in the United States. You might want to read about some of the figures around the founding of Sloan Kettering. Monstrous.
Of course, at the time research protocols were pretty lax. Non human species had basically no rights, and I'm sure Gey never thought he did anything wrong. Today, it feels pretty appalling.