March 8 is International Women’s Day. In health, women are gaining more and more space and standing out for their achievements, including in Radiology. Although the road to equality is still long, some obstacles have already been overcome thanks to solid and intelligent professionals who left their legacy.

The forerunner of women in Radiology was Marie Curie. Born in Warsaw, Poland, while trying to get into higher education, she discovered that no universities accepted girls. At the end of 1891, Marie managed to go to Paris, where she stayed at her sister’s house studied physics, chemistry, and mathematics at the University of Paris.

There, she met her future husband, Pierre Curie – then an instructor at the School of Industrial Physics and Chemistry of the City of Paris. They tried to return to Poland for Marie to work as a scientist in her own country, but the University of Krakow wouldn’t accept her because she was simply a woman.

In the French city, the scientist obtained her doctorate and began researching radioactivity (she invented the term after discovering the element radium in 1902) with Pierre. Frenchman Henri Becquerel, in 1896, discovered that uranium ores emitted a different form of radiation, and the couple contributed to the understanding of the phenomenon. The feat earned the trio the Nobel Prize in Physics in 1903.

Marie Curie was also awarded the Nobel Prize in Chemistry in 1911 and became the first person in history to receive two such awards. At the time, due to the prejudice of the scientific community, a rumor spread she had cheated on her husband. The organizing team even advised her not to go in person to receive the award and suggested a symbolic delivery – however, advised by Albert Einstein, Curie faced the award, society, and prejudice.

May the history of Radiology continue to be written by brave and brilliant women – Happy International Women’s Day!

Women in Latin Safe

Since the 51st São Paulo Radiological Meeting, the initiative Latin Safe has been chaired by a woman, Dr. Martha Oyuela Mancera. The new Executive Committee, established in early 2022, has nine radiologists, six of whom are women. May that number grow more and more!

Sources: BRLaudos and SuperInteressante