DID YOU KNOW? Radium was first discovered in 1898 by Marie and Pierre Curie. It was used to treat cancer after the scientist who discovered radioactivity, Henri Becquerel, left a piece in his pocket and noticed it had burned him. The first treatments involved enclosing radium in a lead box with a small hole and pointing the hole at a tumour. In 1933, it was headline news when the province chose to supply radium to the Ottawa Civic Hospital to treat cancer patients. Following the Second World War, radium was phased out in favour of safer radioactive elements made in nuclear reactors.
