The Indianapolis journal. [volume] (Indianapolis [Ind.]) 1867-1904, 1893-11-13
Vaccination and Smallpox.

To the Editor of the indianapolis Journal:
Your paper has of late devoted some
space to the subject of the efficacy or in
efficacy of vaccination as a preventive of
smallpox, though, perhaps, without settling
the matter either way. In your dispatches
from Muncie published Saturday were some
figures that would seem to throw some
local light on the question, and to show
that vaccination does not protect, though
from them the faint suspicion may be en-
tertained that it may modify the severity
of an attack somewhat. Those figures make
the health officer say that there were 147
cases Owenty-one deaths) during the Mum
Gle epidemic, and, to quote, "all of these
had been vaccinated." Some clubbing sta
t~istics'' as to unsuccessful vaccinations
and notifications were then INDUCED in,
lust as old Jenner used to loftily disarm
criticism with the remark, spurious" or
unsuccessful vaccinations, when atten-
ton was called to the fact that his vaccf-
mated patients were having smallpox,
though their vaccinations were done in just
the same way as those of others who did
not happen to take the disease were. But
he never attempted to explain why per-
sons who had in milking COWS contracted
cowpox from them should have smallpox
also, just the same as those who had not,
for this fact was fatal to his theory.
The belief in vaccination as a safeguard
against smallpox is now to be regarded as
a Illustration of a grotesque
common-folk superstition-an old supersti-
ton cunningly grasped and foisted upon a
having it's origin SIMPLY and solely on ac-
count of the unfortunate jingle between
the words cOwpOX and smallpox, there being
absolutely no other bond OF union or re-
semblance, logical, pathological or Scien-
tific, between the two. 1t is painful to con-
template that Gas Jenner's historians tell
us) Jenner was vain, petulant, crafty and
greedy, imaginative and loose-thinking. He
often suppressed Information damaging to
hic ~ aUnda6 nhiOQfinnC nronfinnd dnnnn-
ton and mystification, and avoided direct
ness in the vaccination matter, knowing
that vaccination did not protect, his first
vaccinations actually being twenty-five
years after those of Benjamin Jesty. But
he was after the $4,000 o which Parliament
voted him (by virtue of the pull which
the p~lace-making measure accompanying
its Introduction was able to eXert.) Seven
years after this vote "Jenner's presence in
London was a bore, and his reputation an
incubus which the profession would gladly
have got rid of" and three years after this
tory July, 1879 says: However painful,
yet it is a duty we owe to the public and
the profession to Napprise them that the
number of all ranks suffering under small
pox, who have previously undergone vac
cination by the most skillful practitioners,
is at present SURPRISINGLY great" Seven
don Medical Observer published the
particulars regarding 535 cases of smallpox
been done by, Jenner himself. And SO it
has continued until the present me-not
protecting from smallpox, but causing dis
ease and death on its own account, though
space is now all too short TO show this.
Even the most rabid vaccinationists will
aver that safety resides only in frequent
vaccinations. For instance. in an article
upholding it published by you recently,
taken from Harper's Weekly, the writer
says that at least four vaccinations are
needed, and every few years thereafter.
| Now, how many persons in this country
have been v~accinated more than twice, or
even more than once? Some English hos
pital statistics on this point are interest
ing: The Metropolitan, London, in 1902.
had 1,677 cases of smallpox among persons
that showed three or more good ~vaccina-
ton marks; Fulharn, in 1878. had 202: Ho-
merton, in 1S71-77, had 1.261, and Deptford,
In 1879, had Az
The moral to be drawn from this Ger
true tale may be that If the Board of
Health or the school boards have the power
TO enforce the vaccination of all the school
children under the police" pretext, why
does it not-believing. as it's members do,
| that vaccination in childhood is not enough
order a general vaccination of all grown
people on the same grounds That is prob
ably a greater contract than il cares to
have on it's hands, yet TO be consistent il
must attempt the work or abandon it's
plan of compulsory vaccination for chill
dren- w. Is. NJ. II.
indianapolis. Nov. Il