The Way of All Flesh [video]

This is a fascinating video by Adam Curtis which explains the origins and uses of HeLa[0] cells, a uterine cancer cell extracted from a black American woman named Henrietta Lacks in 1951 and subsequently used as standard reference material in biomedical research of all kinds, up to and including the present day.

The film, like many of Curtis's, revolves around the almost religious beliefs of scientists that their own understanding and methods would lead to "changing the world" and making a new and better mankind. So often, when powerful and interested people try to sell this idea, the results are pointless and even counterproductive.

Another point of the film is that Henrietta's skin color was a factor in denying her and her family recognition of her contribution to science or to any remuneration from the products made and sold from her cells.

[0] https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/HeLa