History of IMGA

IMGA in its present form was founded in January 2004, but began as an idea ten years before in 1996 when a working group on Medical Geology was established by IUGS.

Its primary aim was to increase awareness among scientists, medical specialists and the general public on the importance of geological factors for health and wellbeing. It was recognised that the limited extent of cooperation and communication among these groups restricted the ability of scientists and public health workers to solve a range of complex environmental health problems. Below follows the history and emergence of IMGA in its current form.

1996

The IUGS commission COGEOENVIRONMENT establishes a working group on Medical Geology.

1997

The working group met at the 4th International Symposium on Environmental Geochemistry. The term “Medical Geology” was adopted.

1998

Workshop with working group in Uppsala, Sweden. Discussions on preparing a textbook on Medical Geology.

2000

A combined meeting and workshop held in Uppsala was attended by 50 people, and included a two-day seminar: “The Geochemical Environment and Human Health”, resulting in a proceedings volume.

The International Geologic Correlations Programme established a new programme: IGCP 454 Medical Geology, jointly sponsored by UNESCO and IUGS. It was chaired by Olle Selinus (Sweden) and co-chaired by Peter Bobrowsky (Canada) and Ed Derbyshire (UK). The aim was to bring together scientists working on Medical Geology issues from the developed and the developing world, focusing on capacity building, training and exchange of information, research and laboratory experiences.

Bob Finkelman and Jose Centeno, both from the US, joined. They brought with them a short course on the health impacts of trace elements and metal ions that was later developed into the short course on Medical Geology

2001

Bob Finkelman and Jose Centeno presented a much appreciated one-day course on Medical Geology at the COGEOEMVIRONMENT meeting in Lusaka, Zambia and at the University of Zambia. It was decided that the short course would be brought to developing countries which faced critical Medical Geology problems. This proposal was supported by the International Commission on Scientific Unions (ICSC) who granted $50,000 in support of short courses in Medical Geology to be held in 2002-2003.

2002

The COGEOENVIRONMENT working group on Medical Geology was given Special Project status to operate directly under IUGS.

International meetings on Medical Geology were held in Chile, Russia, Netherlands, USA and Japan, also covering neighbouring countries and regions.

Medical Geology was marketed in different media and ideas of the book on Medical Geology were developed.

2003

Short courses in Medical Geology were held in Lithuania, Uruguay, Scotland, Brazil, Australia and Malaysia.

2004

In August 2004 in Florence (IGC) it was decided to establish IMGA with about 80 participants at this meeting.

Short courses in Medical Geology were held in Hungary, Canada, South Africa, Australia and India.

Medical Geology was part of the ICSU initiative” Science for Health and Wellbeing” in Paris at the French Academy of Medicine.

2005

Voting of all members in the working group on medical geology. 250 persons voted in favour of the new association, IMGA. None against. The vote was unanimous.

The 1st Hemispheric Conference on Medical Geology was organized in Puerto Rico.

Short courses in Medical Geology were held in Romania, Argentina, Uruguay, Brazil, USA, Egypt, Turkey, Ireland, Sweden and Puerto Rico.

The book ‘Essentials of Medical Geology’ was published by Elsevier.

2006

The International Medical Geology Association WAS formally established January 24, 2006.

A special symposium on Medical Geology was held at the Royal Academy of Sciences in Stockholm.

Short courses in Medical Geology were held in Portugal, Sweden, USA and Beijing.

2007

The 2nd Hemispheric Conference on Medical Geology was held in Atibaya, Brazil.

Short courses in Medical Geology were held in Uruguay, Mexico and Brazil.

2008

United Nations anounced Mediacl Geology as one of the themes of the International Year of Planet Earth.

IMGA had several sessions and a short course at the 33 International Geological Conference in Oslo with 7000 participants.

Short courses in Medical Geology were held in Cyprus, Ghana, Bolivia and Norway.

2009

IMGA was involved in ‘Mapping GeoUnions to the ICSU Framework for Sustainable Health and Wellbeing’ as full members, represented by Olle Selinus and Theo Davies.

IMGA, represented by Olle Selinus, was invited to the US State Department in Washington D.C. as part of a government delegation, where a lunch seminar in Medical Geology was held for the US and Swedish delegations.

The 3rd Hemispheric Conference on Medical Geology was held in Montevideo, Uruguay.

Short courses in Medical Geology were held in Uruguay and Bolivia.

2010

‘Medical geology – a regional synthesis’ was published by Springer.

A Swedish textbook in Medical Geology was published by Studentlitteratur for university students.

Discussions ongoing regarding te establishment of an International Center of Excellence in Medical Geology in Turkey.

Short course in Medical Geology was held in Ireland.

2011

First International Symposium on Medical Geology held at the Autonomous University of Chihuahua, Chihuahua, Mexico on August 26th and 27th.

GEOMED2011-Geological and Medical Sciences for a Safer Environment was held in Bari, Italy, September 20-25, 2011.

Several medical geology-related activities, during the 45th Brazilian Geological Congress on behalf of IMGA was held in Belém, Brazil, from 26th September to 1st October.

2012

First International Symposium on Medical Geology held at the Autonomous University of Chihuahua, Chihuahua, Mexico on August 26th and 27th.

GEOMED2011-Geological and Medical Sciences for a Safer Environment was held in Bari, Italy, September 20-25, 2011.

Several medical geology-related activities, during the 45th Brazilian Geological Congress on behalf of IMGA was held in Belém, Brazil, from 26th September to 1st October.

2013

International Workshop and Regional Conference on Medical Geology Chihuahua, Mexico, March 21-23, 2013.

First Conference on Medical Geology in Republic of Ukraine. Kiev, April 17-18, 2013.

First Interdisciplinary and Scientific Meeting on Environmental Toxicology and Medical Geology, Universidad de la Republica, Montevideo, Uruguay, May 9, 2013.

5th International Conference on Medical Geology (MEDGEO2013) August 24-29, 2013 in Arlington, VA, USA.

Election of IMGA Committee executive (2013-2015): Chair: Prof. Dr. Nelly Manay (Toxicologist), Uruguay; Vice-Chair for Medical Sciences: Dr. Diego Fridman (Physician), Argentina; Vice-Chair for Geosciences: Prof. Dr. Maria Aurora Armienta (Geochemist), Mexico; General Secretary: Dr. Laura Ruhl (Geologist), USA; Treasurer: Dr. Birgitte Hansen (Geologist), Denmark.

2014

Second International Symposium on Medical Geology in Rasht, Iran, February 2014.

DUST 2014 – International Conference on Atmospheric Dust, Castellaneta Marina (Taranto, Italy), 1-6 June 2014.

1st International Symposium in Medical Geology in Africa (ISMGAf), University of Johannesburg, South Africa 24-26th of March 2014.

2015

6th International Conference on Medical Geology – MedGeo’15 was held at the University of Aveiro, Portugal, from the 24th July to the 1st of August, 2015.

During this meeting, in IMGA General Assembleia was decide move the headquarters to Portugal.

Election of IMGA Committee executive (2016-2018): Chair: Prof. Dr. Nelly Manay (Toxicologist), Uruguay; Vice-Chair for Medical Sciences: Dr. Diego Fridman (Physician), Argentina; Vice-Chair for Geosciences: Prof. Dr. Maria Aurora Armienta (Geochemist), Mexico; General Secretary: Dr. Carla Patinha (Geological Engineer), Portugal; Treasurer: Dr. Birgitte Hansen (Geologist), Denmark.

2016

ISEH 2016, ISEG 2016 & Geoinformatics 2016: Joint International Conference on Environment, Health, GIS and Agriculture, Galway, Ireland, August 14 – 20, 2016.

35th International Geological Congress 27 august – 4 September 2016, Cape Town, South Africa.

On 2nd July (2016) the IMGA association was registered in Portugal.

The legal headquarters of the Association are at Campus Universitário de Santiago da Universidade de Aveiro, 3810-193 Aveiro, Portugal.

The Association has the VAT number: 514.055.987.

2017

7th International Conference on Medical Geology – MedGeo’17 was held in Moscow, Russian, from August 28 to September 1, 2017.

The workshop “FUNDAMENTALS OF MEDICAL GEOLOGY” was held during the conference MedGeo’17, on 28 August 2017. Moderators of this workshop were: Jose Centeno, Robert Finkelman, Chaosheng Zhang and Saverio Fiore.

On October 16-20, 2017 the second International Symposium on Medical Geology in Spain under the auspices of the Spain Geological Survey and Institute of Mines, the University of Salamanca – Faculties of Science and Medicine, the Salamanca Clinical Hospital and the University of Granada – School of Pharmacy.

The revision of the IMGA Bylaws was finished and it approved by the effective members (Link with the document).

2018

Election of IMGA Committee executive (2018-2020):

General Assembly Board: Chair – María Aurora Armienta; Co-Chair- José Centeno; Member 1 – Alejandro Villalobos; Member2 – Theophilus Davies

Executive Committee: Chair – Diego Fridman; Co- Chair for Geological Sciences – Elena Gimenez Forcada; Co- Chair for Medical Sciences – Chaosheng Zhang; Secretary- Carla Patinha; Treasurer – Nuno Durães; Councillors – Eduardo Ferreira da Silva, Iosif Volfson, Xinbin Feng, Akinade Shadrach Olatunji, Rita Salgueiro, Ines Tomašek

Audit Committee: Chair- Nelly Mañay; Secretary- Ester Sztein

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History of IMGA