Culture Dish

Skloot on the Cover of Publishers Weekly & Advance Praise for The Immortal Life of Henrietta Lacks

Sat, 14 Nov 2009 11:06:59 -0500

Big week here at Culture Dish! The Immortal Life of Henrietta Lacks and its author (yours truly) were on the cover of Publishers Weekly (please note: THRILLED!). Inside that issue was a profile of me with some of book's backstory, a short excerpt from the book (longer excerpt coming soon in O, the Oprah Magazine), also a story I wrote about the crazy book tour I'm organizing (posted about previously here). But that was just the beginning of this week's HeLa developments.

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Get a Free Copy of The Immortal Life of Henrietta Lacks (aka HeLa) to Consider for Course Adoption, While Supplies Last

Thu, 05 Nov 2009 09:15:16 -0500

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). See below for more information on the book, and advanced praise. It's a story with wide potential for course adoption in the sciences, bioethics, African-American studies, womens studies, creative writing, journalism, and much more. Added bonus: If you teach the book this spring, you can also get me to come speak at your school/in your classes as part of my book tour.
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Court Upholds Rights of Scientists and Patients to Challenge Gene Patents

Mon, 02 Nov 2009 18:23:11 -0500

Some interesting news about the breast cancer patent lawsuit I wrote about for Slate's Double X Magazine a few months ago: A federal district court has just agreed to hear the case. When the lawsuit was first filed, many legal experts I talked to said they were sure the case would get thrown out of court for it's unusual approach, namely that it claims that the practice of patenting genes is unconstitutional See my story about the case here. Filings and other documents related to the case available here. And see below for the full press release about today's news:

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U of Akron Requires DNA from Potential Employees; Feds Open Public Comment Period on Federal Law Protecting DNA

Sat, 31 Oct 2009 11:10:35 -0500

Inside Higher Ed just reported that an adjunct instructor at the University of Akron quit when he was told that he had to submit to DNA testing. "It's not enough that the university doesn't pay us a living wage, or provide us with health insurance," the instructor said, "but now they want to sacrifice the sanctity of our bodies. No." He was right to question their policy: The Genetic Information Nondiscrimination Act of 2008 specifically states:

It shall be an unlawful employment practice for an employer to fail or refuse to hire or to discharge any employee, or otherwise to discriminate against any employee with respect to the compensation, terms, conditions, or privileges of employment of the employee, because of genetic information with respect to the employee

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The Immortal Life of Henrietta Lacks Book Tour - Bring HeLa to Your Town

Thu, 29 Oct 2009 09:59:46 -0500

Lots of excitement and news about my book, The Immortal Life of Henrietta Lacks (aka HeLa), which hits stores February 2nd (after ten years in the works). It just got a starred review in Publishers Weekly and in Booklist, and was chosen as a Barnes & Noble Discover Great New Writers title for Spring 2010. Culture Dish is very excited about all of this. But the big news for this post is that I'm organizing a three-month-long book tour that will have me speaking nationwide at universities, scientific organizations, bookstores, book groups, high schools, and more. If you'd like me to speak about the book, about HeLa, the history and ethics of tissue culture, race and medicine, or any number of other related topics, see the Immortal Life's interactive book tour map below. Click on your region to see when I'm scheduled to be in your area, and email me to bring The Immortal Life to your town.

The Immortal Book Tour is a grass-roots, author-funded tour on a scale that no sane publishing house would or could organize or fund. (For those not familiar with the publishing industry, see here for the New Yorker's humorous take on why this sort of thing is necessary). Crazy as it may be, I'm convinced it will be a fun and effective way to spread the word about this book -- and honestly, after ten years of working on it solo, I'm ready to go talk about it with everyone I can. I admit, I've imagined touring in one of these with cells painted all over it, but at this point, due to budget constraints, I may be touring in one of these. This tour will depend entirely on and funding from talks at universities and other venues, so locations able to help cover expenses get priority (and many, many thanks), but I'm also looking to hear from bookstores and other organizations in towns I'll be visiting, where I'll gladly speak if I'm able to get myself there. Interactive book tour map and link for below the jump (and if you're interested in having me speak at a date after the tour, that works too: my schedule for summer and fall is wide open at this point):

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How to Prevent Obesity in Your Pet

Wed, 28 Oct 2009 09:56:18 -0500

Because of the flood of responses I got to yesterday's post on The Insanity of the FDA Approved Obesity Drug for Dogs, I thought I'd start a series of follow up posts answering the many questions I got by email and in the comments here. The most common question was, Okay, so the drug is a bad idea, but what else can we do to make sure our pets don't get or stay fat? Below is a column I once wrote for Prevention Magazine, followed by tips, which should answer the most common questions:

When I was a teenager, I came home from school one day to find L.C., my family's beagle, lying on the bottom shelf of our refrigerator. She was nearly comatose and shaped like a loaf of bread. We knew L.C. had food issues: She yowled in agony when people ate. She once swiped a Thanksgiving turkey, dragged it out the dog door, and devoured it. She studied us every time we opened the refrigerator. So in retrospect, it's no surprise she ended up inside it.

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The Insanity of the FDA Approved Obesity Drug for Dogs

Tue, 27 Oct 2009 08:32:13 -0500

The other day I took my dogs to the vet for a checkup and saw a woman with her morbidly obese dog waiting to fill her prescription for Slentrol -- the first obesity drug for dogs -- which made me feel the need to resurrect this post below, which I wrote the day the FDA announced they'd approved the drug for use in dogs:

The FDA just announced that they've just approved the first-ever obesity drug for dogs, which really makes me cringe. Why? Because dogs don't have eating disorders -- their owners have feeding disorders.

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Time to Register for ScienceOnline2010!

Mon, 26 Oct 2009 12:20:35 -0500

Yes folks, it's that time again: Registration is now open for the great ScienceOnline2010 meeting that will take place (as always) in Durham, NC in January. The program features many great scientists, science bloggers, and science journalists, and promises to be lots of fun. I'll be running a session with Tom Levenson and Brian Switek called "From Blog to Book: Using Blogs and Social Networks to Develop Your Professional Writing," and I'll also be doing a hands-on, nuts-and-bolts workshop helping folks develop proposals for books and articles. See the program for details, and sign up!

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Agoraphobia Service Monkey Lawsuit Rejected; Seizure Alert Ferret Kicked Out of Mall

Sun, 25 Oct 2009 19:34:32 -0500

Today was a big day for non-canine service animal news, which I keep tabs on here as part of ongoing follow up to my New York Times Magazine article, Creature Comforts, about the use of non-canine service animals (which include ducks, monkeys, horses, goats, and at least one kangaroo). The biggest news is that a court in Missouri has rejected the discrimination case filed by Debby Rose, who I featured in my story. She was forbidden to bring her Macaque monkey Richard into local businesses, despite the fact that she says he's a service monkey trained to help with her agoraphobia (Richard pictured above driving with Debby).

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Today: Nobel Prize Awarded for Telomerase Discovery, and the 58th Anniversary of Henrietta Lacks's Death

Mon, 05 Oct 2009 11:58:16 -0500

It's fitting that today -- the day after the 58th anniversary of Henrietta Lacks's death -- the Nobel Prize in medicine has been awarded to Elizabeth Blackburn, Carol Greider, and Jack Szostak for the discovery of how telomeres and the enzyme telomerase protect chromosomes from degrading over time. In the late eighties, a scientist at Yale used Henrietta's cells (aka HeLa, pictured left) to discover that human cancer cells contain telomerase, which regenerates their chromosomes and prevents them from aging and dying like normal cells. This is one of the reasons why Henrietta's cells are still alive and growing today, fifty-eight years after her death.
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The Immortal Life of Henrietta Lacks Gets Starred PW Review and a Shiny New Cover

Sat, 03 Oct 2009 21:05:12 -0500

Lots of excitement here at Culture Dish: The final cover for The Immortal Life of Henrietta Lacks has arrived (see left). And ... <drum roll> ... the the book's first pre-publication review has hit the press: In the issue coming out this Monday, Publishers Weekly gives The Immortal Life a starred review, calling it, "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." (wOOt!) Full review here and here:

"Science journalist Skloot makes a remarkable debut with this multilayered story about 'faith, science, journalism, and grace.' It is also a tale of medical wonders and medical arrogance, racism, poverty and the bond that grows, sometimes painfully, between two very different women--Skloot and Deborah Lacks--sharing an obsession to learn about Deborah's mother, Henrietta, and her magical, immortal cells. Henrietta Lacks was a 31-year-old black mother of five in Baltimore when she died of cervical cancer in 1951. Without her knowledge, doctors treating her at Johns Hopkins took tissue samples from her cervix for research. They spawned the first viable, indeed miraculously productive, cell line--known as HeLa. These cells have aided in medical discoveries from the polio vaccine to AIDS treatments. What Skloot so poignantly portrays is the devastating impact Henrietta's death and the eventual importance of her cells had on her husband and children. Skloot's portraits of Deborah, her father and brothers are so vibrant and immediate they recall Adrian Nicole LeBlanc's Random Family. Writing in plain, clear prose, Skloot avoids melodrama and makes no judgments. Letting people and events speak for themselves, Skloot tells a rich, resonant tale of modern science, the wonders it can perform and how easily it can exploit society's most vulnerable people." - Publishers Weekly, starred review.
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International Talk Like a Pirate Day

Sat, 19 Sep 2009 13:07:25 -0500

It's that time again: Today , September 19th, is International Talk Like a Pirate Day, Japanese Respect for the Aged day ... and my birthday. It also happens to be the day Giles Corey was "pressed" to death by villagers who stacked increasingly large rocks on him because he'd been declared a witch in the famous Salem Witch Trials (1692). It was the day women were finally allowed to vote (1893) and Butch Cassidy and the Sundance Kid committed their first robbery (1900). It's the anniversary of the first underground nuclear bomb test and the Dodgers last game at Ebbets Field (1957), where they beat the Pittsburgh Pirates, 2-0 (fortunately for me, my father was watching the Dodgers game that day, not the nuclear bomb test). Khruschev was banned from Disneyland on September 19 (1959), 155 people died when a Boeing 747 collided with a mountain in Turkey (1976) and 171 died when their DC-10 was decimated by a terrorist's bomb over the Tunuru Desert in Niger (1989), which probably explains my life-long fear of flying.

September 19th is also the day Twiggy was born, which has always made me happy, and the day Red Fox died, which has always made me sad. This may explain why the Sanford and Son theme is one of my all time favorite songs. It's also the day Scott Fahlman posted the first recorded emoticon :-) to the internet (1982), which I like, and an earthquake in Mexico killed thousands (1985), which I don't like. Hurricane Hugo hit South Carolina (1980), the Guelb El-Kebir massacre hit Algeria (1997), a couple of German tourists discovered Otzi the Iceman, and hours later, death took Dr. Seuss (1991), otherwise known as Theodor Seuss Geisel, who drew animated insects for a bug spray company before he became Dr. Seuss the children's book author. He also penned many a brilliant and bizarre political cartoon. And September 19th isn't our only connection: Dr. Seuss was born in Springfield, MA; I was born in Springfield, IL. And, as many people have pointed out over the years, my last name sounds very much like the name of a Dr. Seuss character. Read the rest of this post... | Read the comments on this post...

Not Dead Yet ...

Tue, 15 Sep 2009 15:45:23 -0500

Yes, that's right, we here at Culture Dish are actually STILL ALIVE! Though you wouldn't know it from our feed. <brushing off cobwebs> ... After a bit of down time, Culture Dish is back. The last several months have been jam packed with pre-publication craziness with my book, The Immortal Life of Henrietta Lacks, which is coming to a bookstore near you on February 9th (and is already available for preorder on amazon!). In coming weeks and months, I'll be posting about the publication process, doing some give-aways of pre-publication galleys of the book, and more. I'll also be blogging some about the fact checking process for the book, which is quite an experience -- my living room has been a fact checking factory for months (see photo). And of course, I'll blog about usual non-book related stuff too. Just bare with my, uh, irregularity for the next few weeks as I finish up all the craziness.
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Patent Dispute Prevents Patients From Getting Promising Drug for Lou Gehrig's Disease

Sun, 17 May 2009 10:29:56 -0500

Speaking of the debate over patents interfering with medical care, there's a story in today's New York Times that mentions the drug Iplex, which has shown promise for treating Lou Gehrig's disease -- a deadly and thus far untreatable degenerative disease (also known as amyotrophic lateral sclerosis).

From the article:

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New Breast Cancer Gene Lawsuit Aims to End to All Gene Patenting. Will it Succeed?

Fri, 15 May 2009 16:29:48 -0500

Earlier this week, the American Civil Liberties Union and several other groups filed suit against Myriad Genetics -- the company that holds the patent on the breast cancer gene. They're hoping to get the breast cancer gene patent revoked, but more than that, they're aiming to stop gene patenting all together.

Today, in my new column in Slate's Double X Magazine, I go into the story of the breast cancer gene and the impact the ACLU claims it's had on science and patient care (a hint: it's not good). I also look at the suit itself, the cases that have come before this one, and what they say about the ACLU's odds for success.

I've covered the long history of legal battles over the ownership of human tissues taken from patients during biopsies (including one case in which a man's cells were patented and licensed for millions of dollars without his knowledge). But this is the first lawsuit challenging all existing gene patents, which could have a huge impact on science. It's fascinating stuff, and it'll be interesting to see what happens next (Myriad hasn't responded to the suit yet).

I'll keep covering the case as it moves forward. For now, as a bit of follow up, here are a few specific details from the lawsuit that I wasn't able to fit into my article:

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