A young Black scientist discovered a pivotal leprosy treatment in the 1920s—but an older colleague took the credit

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A young ****** scientist discovered a pivotal leprosy treatment in the 1920s—but an older colleague took the credit

The island of Molokai, where the Ball Method successfully treated leprosy sufferers. Credit: Albert Pierce Taylor

Hansen’s ********, also called leprosy, is treatable today—and that’s partly thanks to a curious tree and the work of a pioneering young scientist in the 1920s. Centuries prior to her discovery, sufferers had no remedy for leprosy’s debilitating symptoms or its social stigma.

This young scientist,

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, ***** fundamental groundwork for the first effective leprosy treatment globally. But her legacy still prompts conversations about the marginalization of women and people of ****** in science today.

As a

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, I’ve studied Ball’s contributions to medicine, and I’m pleased to see her receive increasing recognition for her work, especially on a

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Who was Alice Ball?

Alice Augusta Ball, born in Seattle, Washington, in 1892, became the

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to earn a master’s degree in science from the College of Hawaii in 1915, after completing her studies in pharmaceutical chemistry the year prior.

After she finished her master’s degree, the college hired her as a research chemist and instructor, and she became the first ******** ********* with that title in the chemistry department.

Impressed by her master’s thesis on the chemistry of

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, Dr. Harry Hollmann with the Leprosy Investigation Station of the U.S. Public Health Service in Hawaii recruited Ball. At the time,

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Doctors now understand that leprosy, also called Hansen’s ********, is minimally contagious. But in 1865, the ***** and stigma associated with leprosy led authorities in Hawaii to implement a mandatory segregation policy, which ultimately isolated those with the ******** on a

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. In 1910,

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This policy overwhelmingly affected Native Hawaiians, who accounted for

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The significance of chaulmoogra oil

Doctors had attempted to use nearly every remedy imaginable to treat leprosy, even experimenting with dangerous substances

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. But the lone consistently effective treatment was chaulmoogra oil.

Chaulmoogra oil is derived from the seeds of

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. Health practitioners

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had been using this oil for centuries as a treatment for various skin *********. But there were limitations with the treatment, and it had only marginal effects on leprosy.

The oil is very thick and sticky, which makes it hard to rub into the skin. The ***** is also notoriously bitter, and patients who ingested it would often start vomiting. Some physicians experimented with injections of the oil, but this

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The Ball Method

The state of Hawaii honored Ball by declaring Feb. 28 Alice Augusta Ball Day.

If researchers could harness chaulmoogra’s curative potential without the ****** side effects, the tree’s seeds could revolutionize leprosy treatment. So, Hollmann turned to Ball.

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, Hollmann documents how the 23-year-old Ball discovered how to chemically adapt chaulmoogra into an injection that had none of the side effects.

The Ball Method, as Hollmann called her discovery, transformed chaulmoogra oil into the most effective treatment for leprosy until the

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In 1920, the Ball Method successfully treated 78 patients in Honolulu. A year later, it treated 94 more, with

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the morale of all the patients drastically improved. For the first time, there was hope for a cure.

Tragically, Ball

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, as she passed away within a year at only 24, likely from exposure to

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in the lab.

Ball’s legacy, lost and found

Ball’s ****** meant she didn’t have the opportunity to publish her research. Arthur Dean, chair 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

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Ball’s other colleagues did attempt to protect Ball’s legacy. A 1920 article in the Journal of the ********* Medical Association praises the Ball Method, while Hollmann clearly credits Ball

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Ball is described at length in a

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, of Current History, an academic publication on international affairs. That feature is excerpted in a

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of Carter G. Woodson’s “****** History Bulletin,” referring to Ball’s achievement and untimely ******.

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, a well-regarded religious volunteer at the leprosy settlements on Molokai, further referenced Ball’s work in a

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for a popular audience.

Historians such as

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later prompted a modern reckoning with Ball’s poor treatment by Dean and others, ensuring that Ball received proper credit for her work. Following Wermager’s and others’ work, the University of Hawaii

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, affixed to the last remaining chaulmoogra tree on campus.

In 2019, the London School of Hygiene and Tropical Medicine

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to the outside of its building. Ball’s story was even featured in a 2020 short film, “

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The Ball Method represents both a scientific achievement and a history of marginalization. A young woman of ****** pioneered a medical treatment for a highly stigmatizing ******** that disproportionately affected an already disenfranchised Indigenous population.

In 2022, then-Gov. David Ige declared Feb. 28 Alice Augusta Ball Day in Hawaii. It was only fitting that

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took place on the Mānoa campus in the shade of the chaulmoogra tree.

Provided by
The Conversation

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under a Creative Commons license. Read the

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Citation:
A young ****** scientist discovered a pivotal leprosy treatment in the 1920s—but an older colleague took the credit (2024, April 15)
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