A young black scientist discovered a vital treatment for leprosy within the Twenties – but an older colleague took the credit

Hansen's disease, also generally known as leprosy, is now treatable — and that's thanks partly to an odd tree and the work of a pioneering young scientist within the Twenties. Centuries before its discovery, victims had no cure for leprosy's debilitating symptoms or its social stigma.

This young scientist, Alice Balllaid the muse for the world's first effective leprosy treatment. But her legacy continues to spark discussions today in regards to the marginalization of girls and other people of color in science.

As a Bioethicist and medical historianI actually have studied Ball's contributions to medicine and am pleased to see her increasingly recognized for her work, one specifically Disease that continues to be stigmatized.

Who was Alice Ball?

Alice Augusta Ball, born in 1892 in Seattle, Washington, was the first woman and first African American In 1915, she earned a master's degree in science from the College of Hawaii, having graduated the previous 12 months with a level in pharmaceutical chemistry.

After completing her master's degree, the school hired her as a research chemist and lecturer, and she or he became the primary African American to carry that title within the chemistry department.

Impressed by her master's thesis on the chemistry of the kava plantDr. Harry Hollmann of the US Public Health Service Leprosy Investigation Station in Hawaii recruited Ball. At the time, Leprosy was a serious public health problem in Hawaii.

Doctors now know that leprosy, also generally known as Hansen's disease, is simply minimally contagious. But in 1865, the fear and stigma related to leprosy led authorities in Hawaii to institute mandatory segregation policies that ultimately isolated those with the disease distant peninsula on the island of Molokai. In 1910 There were over 600 lepers living in Molokai.

These policies predominantly affected Native Hawaiians over 90% of all those exiled to Molokai.

The Importance of Chaulmoogra Oil

Doctors had tried using almost every treatment conceivable to treat leprosy and even experimented with dangerous substances like arsenic and strychnine. But the one consistently effective treatment was Chaulmoogra oil.

Chaulmoogra oil is extracted from the seeds of the chaulmoogra tree. alternative practitioner in India and Burma This oil has been used for hundreds of years to treat various skin diseases. However, the treatment got here with limitations and had little effect on leprosy.

The oil may be very thick and sticky, making it difficult to rub into the skin. The drug can also be known to be bitter and patients who’ve taken it have often vomited. Some doctors experimented with injecting the oil, but this produced painful pustules.

The ball method

If researchers could harness Chaulmoogra's healing potential without the unpleasant unintended effects, the tree's seeds could revolutionize leprosy treatment. So Hollmann turned to Ball. In an article from 1922Hollmann documents how the 23-year-old Ball found out how one can chemically convert Chaulmoogra into an injection that had no unintended effects.

The Ball Method, as Hollmann called her discovery, turned Chaulmoogra oil into essentially the most effective leprosy treatment so far Introduction of sulfones within the late Forties.

In 1920, 78 patients in Honolulu were successfully treated using the Ball method. A 12 months later it treated 94 more The Public Health Service points this out The morale of all patients improved dramatically. For the primary time there was hope for a cure.

Tragically, ball didn't have the chance to enjoy this performancesince she died inside a 12 months on the age of only 24, probably consequently of Chlorine gas within the laboratory.

Ball's legacy, lost and located

Ball's death meant she had no opportunity to publish her research. Arthur Dean, chairman of the College of Hawaii's chemistry department, took over the project.

Dean mass-produced the treatment and published a series of articles on Chaulmoogra oil. He renamed Ball's method the “Dean method” and He never credited Ball for her work.

Ball's other colleagues tried to guard Ball's legacy. A 1920 article within the Journal of the American Medical Association praises the Ball method, while Hollmann clearly credits Ball in his own 1922 article.

Ball is described intimately in a Article from 1922 in Volume 15, Issue 5, of Current History, a tutorial publication on international affairs. This function is shown in an excerpt June 1941 edition from Carter G. Woodson's “Negro History Bulletin,” which pertains to Ball's achievement and his premature death.

Joseph Duttona respected religious volunteer within the leper settlements on Molokai, referred to Ball's work in one other article 1932 memoir published widely for a well-liked audience.

Historians like Paul Wermager later led to a contemporary reckoning with Ball's poor treatment by Dean and others and ensured that Ball received appropriate credit for her work. Following the work of Wermager and others, the University of Hawaii was founded Ball honored with a bronze plaque in 2000attached to the last remaining chaulmoogra tree on campus.

In 2019, the London School of Hygiene and Tropical Medicine added Ball's name to the surface of his constructing. Ball's story was even featured in a 2020 short film: “The ball method.”

The Ball Method represents each a scientific achievement and a story of marginalization. A young woman of color pioneered the medical treatment of a highly stigmatizing disease that disproportionately affected an already disenfranchised indigenous population.

In 2022, then-Gov. David Ige declared February twenty eighth Alice Augusta Ball Day in Hawaii. That was only fitting the ceremony took place on the Mānoa campus under the shade of the Chaulmoogra tree.