Hello everyone,
I'm Nidhi Gupta, and this is Women Weekly! In this week of discussing the wonderful women in STEM, we are back with yet another incredible story of Alice Augusta Ball, a young chemist who revolutionized leprosy treatment forever.
In the early 20th century, leprosy was a disease without a cure, and its victims were cast aside and forced into isolation. But one young chemist would change the course of history. Meet Alice Augusta Ball, a brilliant mind who, at just 23 years old, made a breakthrough that saved countless lives.
After becoming the first woman and the first African American woman to earn a master's degree in chemistry from the University of Hawaii, Ball quickly delved into a critical problem: leprosy. At the time, treatments were scarce, ineffective, or agonizing. The chaulmoogra tree oil was known to offer some relief but was far too thick to be easily absorbed by the body.
Ball, with her scientific prowess, found a way to extract the active ingredients from chaulmoogra oil and transform them into an injectable form, which could be more readily used by the body. This technique, which became known as the ‘Ball Method,’ was revolutionary. It offered real hope to leprosy patients who had previously been abandoned by the medical community.
Tragically, Ball’s life was cut short at just 24 due to complications that arose from her work in the lab. Her groundbreaking research was far from complete, and she didn’t live to see the impact it would have on the world. Sadly, in a twist of events that reflected the times, Arthur L. Dean, president of the University of Hawaii, continued her research and published the findings under his own name, dubbing the technique the ‘Dean Method.’ For years, Ball's critical contribution went unrecognized, overshadowed by someone who didn’t deserve the credit.
It wasn’t until six years after her death that the assistant surgeon at Kalihi Hospital, Dr. Harry T. Hollmann, who had encouraged Ball to study chaulmoogra oil, spoke out. He published a paper giving Alice Augusta Ball the recognition she rightfully deserved. As Paul Wermager, a retired librarian who has spent over 20 years bringing Ball's story to light, said: “Since we cannot bring Alice back to life, the least we can do is tell the story of her life as honestly and thoroughly as possible so people will know about her outstanding work today and in the future.”
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