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Rebecca Skloot is an award-winning science writer, and author of the New York Times Bestselling book The Immortal Life of Henrietta Lacks. It tells the story of HeLa -- the first immortal human cell line ever grown in culture (pictured in the blog's banner) -- the woman those cells came from, and the family she left behind. The book has been featured on Fresh Air with Terry Gross, CBS Sunday Morning, The Colbert Report, and many others. To see those segments and find information, reviews, book special features, and more, visit her website. Skloot is also a contributing editor at Popular Science magazine; she's worked as a correspondent for WNYC's RadioLab, and PBS's Nova ScienceNOW. Her writing appears in The New York Times Magazine, O: The Oprah Magazine, Discover and others.
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Category: Bioethics
Today's Baltimore Sun features a great OpEd by Ruth Faden, director of the bioethics institute at Johns Hopkins, exploring the ethical and moral issues raised by The Immortal Life of Henrietta Lacks, and its relevance to the current debate over...
Posted by Rebecca Skloot at 9:49 AM • 14 Comments • 0 TrackBacks
Category: Appearances
I've been posting about my impending book tour, and all the great coverage the book has been getting, on Twitter and Facebook, but thought I'd also post a bit of an update and press round up here, for those who (gasp) don't spend all of their time in those places.
Posted by Rebecca Skloot at 6:09 PM • 8 Comments • 0 TrackBacks
Category: Bioethics
Big week at Culture Dish: Skloot and "The Immortal Life of Henrietta Lacks" on the cover of Publishers Weekly; an excerpt published; early praise from Susan Orlean, Ted Conover, Eric Schlosser, Adrian Nicole LeBlanc and others; and professors respond to The Immortal Life.
Posted by Rebecca Skloot at 11:06 AM • 17 Comments • 0 TrackBacks
Category: Bioethics
Calling all academics: If you'd like a free advanced copy of my book, The Immortal Life of Henrietta Lacks, to consider it for course adoption, get thee to Random House's academic blog and request a copy quick, while supplies last (which probably won't be long at the rate things are going).
Posted by Rebecca Skloot at 9:15 AM • 10 Comments • 0 TrackBacks
Category: Bioethics
A federal district court has just agreed to hear the ACLU's case against the breast cancer gene patent. When the case was first filed, many legal experts were sure the case would be dismissed due to it's unusual approach: it claims that the practice of patenting genes is unconstitutional.
Posted by Rebecca Skloot at 6:23 PM • 3 Comments • 0 TrackBacks
Category: Bioethics
In a starred pre-publication review, Publishers Weekly calls The Immortal Life of Henrietta Lacks (about HeLa, by yours truly), "a remarkable debut ... a rich, resonant tale of modern science, the wonders it can perform and how easily it can exploit society's most vulnerable people." See post for full review, and the book's shiny new cover!
Posted by Rebecca Skloot at 9:05 PM • 6 Comments • 0 TrackBacks
Category: Bioethics
Speaking of the debate over patents interfering with medical care: A promising new drug for treating Lou Gehrig's disease (ALS) is not available to patients due to a patent dispute.
Posted by Rebecca Skloot at 10:29 AM • 9 Comments • 0 TrackBacks
Category: Bioethics
The ACLU has launched a suit against the holder of the breast cancer gene patent with hopes of stopping the practice of gene patenting. Skloot covers the suit, its history, and its odds of success.
Posted by Rebecca Skloot at 4:29 PM • 35 Comments • 0 TrackBacks
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