The Great Read: The Researcher Who Didn’t Want to Know
Her decades of work on Huntington’s disease helped lead to the creation of a genetic test for the devastating condition. Why didn’t she take it herself?
The New York Times
The Great Read
June 11, 2026, 2:01 p.m. Eastern time

On weekdays and Sundays, we recommend one piece of exceptional writing from The Times — a narrative or essay that takes you someplace you might not expect to go.

Nancy Wexler wears a blue patterned shirt and sits in a wheelchair in a corner of her apartment with large windows, basking in the sun with her eyes closed. A small black-and-white photo in a frame shows her when she was younger, her eyes closed and facing the sky in the smaller photo as well.

Jackie Molloy for The New York Times

The Researcher Who Didn’t Want to Know

Her decades of work on Huntington’s disease helped lead to the creation of a genetic test for the devastating condition. Why didn’t she take it herself?

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