HAVANA, Cuba, Feb 11 (ACN) On the occasion of the International Day of Women and Girls in Science, Miguel Diaz-Canel Bermudez, first secretary of the Central Committee of the Communist Party of Cuba and president of the country, recognized today the island’s women scientists, who currently represent 53 % of the workers in that sector.
The head of state highlighted on Twitter the dedication of women in Cuban science, and expressed that there is still a long way to go to make their role more visible.
The United Nations Educational, Scientific and Cultural Organization (UNESCO), in its latest World Science Report, placed Cuba among the top 20 nations in the world with the highest proportion of women researchers.
The document also highlighted that among the 10 best Academies of Sciences in terms of the proportion of female members, six are from Latin America and the Caribbean: Cuba with 27 %, the Caribbean (26 %), Mexico and Nicaragua (23 %), Peru (20 %) and Uruguay (19 %).
Recently, the director of the Research Center of the Pedro Kouri Institute of Tropical Medicine (IPK), Maria Guadalupe Guzman Tirado, was awarded the L’Oréal-Unesco International Prize for Women in Science, which recognizes five women scientists from around the world with exceptional careers.
UNESCO and the French company L’Oréal have also distinguished Doctor of Science Gladys Gutierrez Bugallo (from the IPK’s Vector Control Department) with the Young Talent Award for Women in Science.
Hilda Garay Perez, PhD, head of the Synthetic Peptides Group at the Center for Genetic Engineering and Biotechnology (CIGB), won the Latin American Women in Chemistry 2021 Award, given by the American Chemical Society (ACS) and the Latin American Federation of Chemical Associations (FLAQ).
