24
Superintendents of Vaccination
might be also Sanitary Officers in
their Circles.
21. The general extension of vaccination and, through this agency, the extinc-
tion of small-pox are the objects most closely con-
nected with this Department; at the same time, as
all Superintendents of Vaccinations are Medical Offi-
cers, I believe that their presence in the district
daring several months in the year could be turned to advantage for other practical
purposes. I have often regretted being myself unable to recommend, nay, enforce,
certain simple sanitary measures in the towns and villages I came across. Such is
generally the total disregard of all hygienic measures, that I can no more be astonish-
ed at the great havoc annually made by several preventible diseases, such as fever,
dysentery, cholera, &c., but only wonder that sickness and mortality are not greater
than they actually are. In my opinion great advantages would be derived if the
Superintendents of Vaccination were appointed Sanitary Commissioners of their
respective Circles, so that, whilst effectually striving to annihilate one of our most
dreaded diseases,—variola,—they would, at the same time, by causing the destruction of
the germs of many fatal diseases, improve to a great extent the sanitation of the
country, and materially assist in increasing its prosperity and welfare.
Towns which have a Dispen-
sary do not require a Municipal
Vaccinator.
22. In towns in which a Dispensary is situated I am opposed to the entertain-
ment of a Municipal Vaccinator. By Circular No.
2990 of 1868, from the Inspector General, Indian
Medical Department, Subordinates and others hold-
ing independent Medical charges are informed that
vaccination is an important part of the work of all holding independent Medical
charges, consequently the Medical Subordinates and others in charge of Dispensaries
are bound to see after the vaccination of the towns in which they reside. With the
exception of the Medical Officers in charge of the Dispensaries of Dapoolee, Sawunt
Warree, and Vingorla, whose work is very fair, all the others have very much neglected
vaccination, and have done nothing to forward its cause. These Medical Subordinates
should acquire such confidence, respect, and influence from the people among whom
they live, that in their hands vaccination should be gratefully accepted, and not meet
with the opposition that but too often in towns attends the efforts of the itinerant
District Vaccinator. I fear that some of the Subordinates and others in independent
Medical charges have strange notions on the subject, and consider it rather below
their dignity to vaccinate ; forgetting, in false pride, that vaccination is daily performed
by the highest of the Medical profession, and its cause associated with a name honoured
under every clime—that of the immortal Jenner.
Introduction of Animal Vaccine.
23. Shortly after my return to India I vaccinated a calf with some spontaneous cow-
pox lymph I had brought with me, and which I had
collected from the last heifer I vaccinated in London,
where I had made a series of experiments with that lymph. At Bombay I used both
liquid lymph in tubes and some dried on ivory points. The first failed, but, fortunately,
from the second a certain number of vesicles were obtained, with which a second