About us
The RAMAZZINI ISTITUTE was founded in 1987 by Professor Cesare Maltoni as a non-profit social cooperative. It has over 35,000 members and for over 35 years has been battling with cancer and environmental diseases.
Since 2009 the Ramazzini Institute has taken direct responsibility for running the Cesare Maltoni Cancer Research Centre which has its headquarters in the Castle of Bentivoglio, near Bologna, Italy. In 2021 the Ramazzini Institute celebrates 50 years of life of its Research Center.
The mission of the Ramazzini Institute is primary and secondary prevention in line with the main teaching to come down from the Carpi doctor, Bernardino Ramazzini (1633-1714), father of occupational medicine: “it is better to prevent than to treat”.
The Institute works to hone strategies for monitoring tumours and other environmental non- communicable diseases via scientific research, promotion of early diagnosis and circulation of information.
The aims of the Ramazzini Institute are:
- To implement schemes of tumour prevention by a strategy based on promotion of scientific research
- To train specialised staff
- To circulate information on environmental and work-related cancer risks
- To set up clinical programmes of early tumour diagnosis.
50 YEARS OF INDEPENDENT RESEARCH
For the 50 years since its founding in 1971, The Cancer Research Center of the Ramazzini Institute has been an internationally recognized center of excellence, renowned for its many outstanding contributions to research into the environmental, occupational and chemical causes of cancer
and revered for its integrity and scientific independence.
Results of long-term studies performed at the Cancer Research Center of the Ramazzini Institute have demonstrated the carcinogenicity of vinyl chloride, benzene, formaldehyde and oxygenated gasoline additives, among others. This research has had an enormously important impact on environmental and occupational medicine, catalyzing the launch of prevention programs and the establishment of health standards that have safeguarded human health and saved the lives of many thousands of persons worldwide.
Protecting public health through prevention has always been the principal objective of the Ramazzini Institute, and the independence of its Cancer Research Center has permitted science and truth to prevail over special interests.
The Cancer Research Center was dedicated in 2005 to Professor Cesare Maltoni, founder of the Ramazzini Institute and the Collegium Ramazzini. Professor Maltoni died prematurely in 2001. Now, 21 years after his death, I urge his faithful collaborators and the Ramazzini Institute to maintain excellence in their work and independence in their science.
Professor Philip J. Landrigan MD, MSc, DIH, FAAP, FACOEM
Director, Program in Global Public Health and the Common Good
Director, Global Observatory on Pollution and Health
Professor of Biology
Boston College
President, International Scientific Advisory Board Ramazzini Institute
President Emeritus Collegium Ramazzini
