Fiorella Belpoggi was Scientific Director and Scientific Advisor of the Istituto Ramazzini (Ramazzini Institute)  in Bologna until 2023. From 1981 to 2001, she worked closely with Professor Cesare Maltoni, an internationally renowned oncologist; then she was Scientific Director of the same Institute. Expert in the study of agents that can determine cancers and other environmental pathologies, such as plastic monomers, asbestos, fuels and additives of petrol, pesticides, in particular endocrine disruptors chemicals, ionizing radiation and low frequency electromagnetic fields (ELF-EMF), radio frequency (RF-EMF), heavy metals, etc. She paid particular attention to the issue of nutrition and the risks related to simultaneous exposure even to small doses of chemicals or physical agents, especially during embryonic and fetal life, as well as in childhood. She also took care of the evaluation of the effectiveness of pharmaceutical and herbal drugs and active ingredients in preventing the onset and development of neoplasms.

She is a member of the International Academy of Toxicological Pathology (IATP), the American Society of Toxicological Pathology (STP) and the European Society of Pathology (ESTP), the New York Academy of Sciences, and the Executive Council of the Collegium Ramazzini, an International Academy of over 180 independent expert members in the field of occupational and environmental diseases, representing 36 countries in the world (www.ramazzini.org).  She is an active member of the Scientific Committee of the International Society of Doctors for Environment-Italy; Honorary President of the Bologna Apennines Bio-district; member of the Observatory “Placido Rizzotto” (Union for the safeguard of agricultural workers’ health); member of the National Scientific Committee of the Italian Professional Order of Biologists. For two decades she was the reference person for the relations of the Ramazzini Institute with the important US National Institute of Environmental Health Sciences (NIEHS); she has been repeatedly called to the European Commission to report on relevant health and environmental issues. She was part of the Working Groups of the IARC for the drafting of Monographs 120 on Benzene, 125 and 130 on some industrial compounds, and the working group that established the priorities IARC 2020-2024. She was recently invited to join the EU SCHEER RF-EMF Working Group and the EFSA Working Group on the Assessment of Glyphosate Re-authorisation Application in Europe. She was appointed by the “Panel for the Future of Science and Technology (EPRS/STOA) European Parliament , to prepare the report “Health impact of 5G” for the European Parliament, published in June 2021.

Dr Belpoggi has been awarded in several occasions for her work in defence of environmental and occupational health, including the “Lorenzo Tomatis (past director of IARC ) award from ISDE- Italy, the “Tina Anselmi award 2018”, dedicated to women who have distinguished themselves professionally, sponsored by the City of Bologna, and the prestigious international Ramazzini award in 2007 for her contribution to cancer research. She participated as a procitizens expert in the MTBE Groundwater Pollution Trial in Jacksonville, Baltimore, USA, where injured people received over $1 billion in compensation from the polluting company, Exxon. For years she has supported as an office technical consultant the causes of compensation for asbestos victims and for other workers who have suffered occupational exposures to hazardous chemical and physical agents, with emerging, but hardly recognized, occupational cancers. 

She is a point of reference for municipalities, Italian government, citizens and associations on issues relating to public health, such as, recently, the presence of asbestos in drinking water, the residue of the herbicide glyphosate and other pesticide in water and food, very low frequency (ELMELF) and high frequency (RF EMF) electromagnetic fields. She has held several academic positions; was a member of the Council of the Faculty of Veterinary Sciences of the University of Padua, Adjunct Professor at the School of Specialty in Oncology of the University of Turin, Professor of Environmental Sciences at the Department of Public Health of the University of Bologna (UNIBO). She has held master classes at the Faculty of Law and at the Faculty of Statistical Sciences for Environmental Epidemiology, Agriculture and Veterinary of UNIBO, at the School of Specialty in Oncology of the same University. 

She is an author of over 200 publications in peer-reviewed scientific journals, national and international, and more than 20 chapters of books, including two (6th and 7th) editions of Patty’s Toxicology, one of the most prestigious texts of toxicology; has been an editor of several scientific-themed volumes, in particular with contents of public health and environmental sciences, including some volumes published by the New York Academy of Sciences, NYC.  In 2024 she was co-author of a chapter in the Textbook of Children’s Environmental Health, Edited by Philip J. Landrigan and Ruth A. Etzel, on Children Health and electromagnetic fields.

In 2022 she published for the publishing house Terranuova (Italy) the book “Fiorella Belpoggi: storia di una scienziata libera”, (Fiorella Belpoggi: history of an independent scientist) edited by Licia Granello. 

Currently, after retirement, she continues to deal with environmental toxicology issues, both voluntarily and as a professional; is engaged in disseminating and advising on issues in which she is considered an expert, namely the relationship between the working and living environment and health.

Full CV with Dr. Belpoggi’s publications below