LGBT+ history month occurs every February, with a different theme every year. The theme of LGBT+ history month this year surrounds itself with activism and social change, which provides an opportunity to explore the contribution to make the world a better place for all people. This blog will look into LGBTQ+ figures, both today and throughout history, who have had a major impact on heathcare.
Notable Figures
Magnus Hirschfield
Bryan-Quamina, G. (2024) Magnus Hirschfield and the Institute for Sexual Science. Science Museum. Available at: X (Accessed 6 November 2024)
Magnus Hirschfield founded the Institute for Sexual Science (translated), and was invested in using science to improve the lives of people in the LGBTQ+ community. He was a gay man but never publicly came out due to it being illegal to be homosexual in Germany at the time. He founded the Scientific-Humanitarian Community which campaigned to overturn Paragraph 175 of the German penal code which criminalised same-sex relations between men.
Sophia Jex-Blake
University of Toronto (n.d.) Queer Women in the History of Medicine: Sophia Jex-Blake and Women’s Medical Education in Victorian Britain, Fisher Library. Available at: X (Accessed 6 November 2024)
She was a member of the “Edinburgh Seven” who campaigned for nearly a decade for the right as women to attend medical school. She garnered national attention and support from prominent physicists and scientists, including Charles Darwin
Alan Hart
Deluca (2021) Trailblazing Transgender Doctor Saved Countless Lives. Scientific American. Available at: X (Accessed 6 February 2025)
Hart was born as a woman, but identified as male since childhood. After transition, worked at a multitude of different hospitals, but was shunned once someone found out that they were not born as a man. He Continued his work, and graduated from the University of Pennsylvania with a master’s in radiology in 2028. He was a pioneer in using chest x-rays to detect tuberculosis, which was something that people were not doing at that time.
Bruce Voeller
Apmann (2021) Dr. Bruce Voeller. Gay Rights and Public Health Pioneer. Village Preservation. Available at: X (Accessed 6 February 2025)
He was a pioneer of AIDS research and early gay rights activist who came out as gay at age 29, and focussed his research and work on human sexuality and sexually transmitted diseases. He was an early president of the Gay Activists Alliance (GAA) which was founded in 1969, and was part of a group that brokered the very first meeting of an LGVT group with the White House.
Margarethe Cammermeyer
Suderman (n.d.) 2015 Distinguished Alumni Veteran Col. Margarethe Cammermeyer, M.A. ’76, Ph.D. ’91, U.S. Army. University of Washington. Available at: X (Accessed 6 February 2025)
She served as an army nurse, but was honourably discharged when pregnant as it was mandated that women with children could not serve in active duty. When this policy changed, she immediately started the paperwork to get back into the reserves. Whist raising her four sons, she earned a master’s degree in nursing in 1976, and then completed her PHS in 1991. She separated from her partner, and met her future wife, and spoke out her sexual orientation as a “matter of honesty”.
Events
Queer Anatomies with Michael Sappol
Royal College of Physicians Museum
As part of LGBT+ History Month, the Royal College of Physicians Museum will be hosting American historian of the visual culture of medicine and science, Michael Sappol, who will be discussing his new book “Queer Anatomies”.
Get tickets: https://www.artsjobs.org.uk/events/55728
University of Oxford LGBT+ History Month Lecture 2025
Dr Mary Jean Chan
Dr Mary Jean Chan explores the role of queer poetry in their own journey of becoming a poet, editor and lecturer of creative writing.
Transgender history (and why it matters to you)
Explore transgender histories and the importance that this history has in conversations surrounding health, welfare and the rights of transgender people today. The session explores the challenges of relating historical frameworks of sex and gender to our own modern systems and discuss how this must help shape the making of future policies.
LGBTQ+ History Month 2025: An Evening with the Linden Archives
An evening with Stuart Linden Rhodes and the Linden Archives, looking at photographs from the UK queer scene of the 1990s.
Get tickets: https://www.yorksj.ac.uk/events/upcoming/lgbtq-history-month-2025-an-evening-with-the-linden-archives.php
These are just a small amount of the many events occurring in LGBT+ history month that would be beneficial for those interested in any of the topics listed. There are further opportunities available for people seeking other examples of events where tickets are still able to be purchased.
This blog has highlighted the importance within medicine that members of the LGBTQ+ community have contributed, and how these groups have been oppressed as a community throughout history from both a social perspective as well as a medical perspective. For further resources surrounding LGBT+ History month, as well as charities surrounding this, look at:
Stonewall: https://www.stonewall.org.uk/
LGBT+ History Month: https://lgbtplushistorymonth.co.uk/
GLADD: https://gladd.co.uk/
Mind Out: https://mindout.org.uk/
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