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The family of former YouTube CEO Susan Wojcicki has launched a YouTube channel to fight against lung cancer two years after her death.
Wojcicki, who was a mother of five, died of lung cancer at age 56 in August 2024, two years after she was diagnosed with non-small cell lung cancer.
The CEO wrote in a blog post that was shared after her death that she had been blindsided by news of the illness because she had almost no symptoms, saying: “I had never smoked so I was totally shocked with this diagnosis.”
Inspired by the lack of knowledge about misconceptions about lung cancer, Wojcicki’s husband Dennis Troper and the rest of her family launched a foundation this spring to work to change how lung cancer is detected, diagnosed and prevented.
On Thursday, the Susan Wojcicki Foundation launched a YouTube channel that will feature scientists and influencers collaborating in videos that hope to share life-saving information in an easily accessible way.
The channel, established at the beginning of Lung Cancer Awareness Month, will feature interviews, shorts and videos with creators including MrBeast and Lilly Singh, the organization told People.
In the first video shared Thursday, famous YouTube creators reflected on Wojcicki’s legacy. Singh — a Canadian YouTuber who first started making videos on the platform in 2010 — said: “Honestly, when I think about YouTube, YouTube is synonymous with Susan for me. She was incredibly supportive to creators. I think she revolutionized what it means to have platform-creator relationships in the sense of I felt so valued and so seen.”
After Wojcicki stepped down from her CEO position following her diagnosis, she wrote that she planned to understand lung cancer as much as she could.
She wrote in her final message: “My goals going forward are to enjoy the present as much as possible and fight for better understanding and cures for this disease.”
“Lung cancer is often misunderstood, and there’s a real knowledge gap when it comes to the disease,” Kelly Galvin, the foundation’s chief communications and marketing officer, told People. “We want to change that and be part of the dinner-table conversation. That means meeting people where they already are, including on YouTube with the creators they know and love.”
She continued: “Along with creators, we’re bringing together leading scientists and experts, nonprofits, and people whose lives have been directly impacted by lung cancer to share what the science says in a way that’s clear and relatable. It might be shorts explaining lung cancer or stigma, or a collaboration discussing who’s at risk and who can get screened. Or it might be a deeper dive into the new advances that are changing what’s possible.”
