An excerpt from NBC News -
Meet the student bringing Black illustrations to the medical field
Chidiebere Ibe said he hopes his creations will help change the field of medical illustration, which is predominately white and male.
By Char Adams
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| Chidiebere Ibe started drawing medical illustrations featuring Black bodies about a year ago. "I made a deliberate action to constantly advocate that there be inclusion of Black people in medical literature,” he told NBC News.Chidiebere Ibe |
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| Chidiebere Ibe. Courtesy Chidiebere Ibe |
Have you ever seen a medical illustration featuring a Black body? Social media users admitted they hadn’t when an image of a Black fetus in a Black woman’s womb went viral this month.
Chidiebere Ibe, 25, is behind the image. The Nigerian medical student, who will enter Kyiv Medical University in Ukraine next month, describes himself as a self-taught medical illustrator. He said he’s spent at least a year learning to draw anatomy, focusing on Black skin every step of the way.
“I wasn’t expecting it to go viral,” Ibe, an aspiring pediatric neurosurgeon, said of the image in an interview. “I was just sticking up for what I believe in, advocating for equality in health through medical illustrations. I made a deliberate action to constantly advocate that there be inclusion of Black people in medical literature.”
He began publishing the images on social media, showing conditions like empyema thoracis and seborrheic eczema on Black skin. Many of the images show skin conditions prevalent with Black people, combating a misrepresentation that often leads to misdiagnosis. The fetus illustration went viral after a Twitter user shared the photo, writing, “I’ve literally never seen a black foetus illustrated, ever.” The post was retweeted more than 50,000 times, and the illustration garnered more than 88,000 “likes” on Instagram and even made its way to TikTok. Ibe drew praise from medical professionals far and wide.
“Little did I understand what the drawing meant to a lot of people. On my LinkedIn, on my Twitter, on my Instagram, I read the comments and they really touched me. I was crying,” Ibe said. “It was amazing to see how good people felt about it. People could see themselves in the drawing.”
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