A Conversation with Rebecca Skloot

WKNO's Pierre Kimsey interviews Rebecca Skloot, science journalist and contributing editor at Popular Science magazine who makes her home in Memphis. The Immortal Life of Henrietta Lacks, her debut book, uncovers the heretofore unknown story of the woman whose cancerous cells were cultivated, without her family's consent or knowledge, into the first "immortal" human cell culture and helped provide some of the major advances in 20th century medicine.

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[redrum41987]

You need to get out more, there are profound liars of every race.

[saltemann]

SKLOOT!

[Joe Garcia]

The white man is the devil. He is the most profound of liars.

I can imagine a world without him.

[sheshe0]

Good thing I am not a member of that family because she would not have gotten two words from me...the Lacks family should get half of every penny made on this book...not some damn schalorship fund...that's some bullshit!!!

[brentindavis]

wow!!!! thats just pure evil..... no telling how they are using this as a weapon against us.....

[theleftflank]

Ignorance has nothing to do with it. & how can hate be false, unless you mean to suggest that I am in love with Skloot! Also, I sincerely doubt you know her well enough to be able to vouch for her character, but... whatever.

My point: Many take from blacks only to enrich themselves. It just so happens that this 1 had the good luck & the foresight to cover a story with enough juice to take her over the top. Her work, her money - I get it! Just don't fake the funk!

[emidnite]

skloot set up a foundation for the family that takes care of them and gives them health care

[Virat Kohli]

Do not speak with ignorance and false hate. Skloot is a genuinely good person.

"The Immortal Life of Henrietta Lacks" by Rebecca Skloot. On Page 251, Skloot writes, "Each time I told her [Deborah] the same thing: I hadn't sold the book yet, so at that point I was paying for my research with student loans and credit cards. And regardless, I couldn't pay her for her story. Instead, I said, if the book ever got published, I would set up a scholarship fund for descendants of Henrietta Lacks."

[rjohson]

my mistake i believe your right, i remebre reading the family asking for some of the proceeds and i believe the author said no.

[theleftflank]

@rjohson Greetings, I have gone over the book and could not find where it indicated that a portion of the proceeds would go to the family. In fact, if you look @this video and others on the web you'll see that at no time does the family mention that they were recompensed for the intrusive experiments and eventual profit-making of the now ubiquitous Hela Cells. However, the author does have a website that allows visitors to donate money directly to the family but that is separate I'm afraid.