Vaccination

• Vaccination


  Until the 1700s, people had few effective ways to prevent the spread of disease. Edward Jenner's discovery of the smallpox vaccine was a landmark in the development of preventive medicine.
• Before Jenner the only way to prevent Smallpox was Inoculation
• In the 1700s, smallpox was one of the most deadly diseases - in 1751, over 3500 people died of smallpox in London alone
• Inoculation


  1. Making a cut in a patient's arm

  2. Soaking it in pus taken from the swelling of somebody who already had a mild form of smallpox
• Inoculation was introduced into Britain from Turkey by Lady Mary Wortley Montagu in 1718
• Inoculation


  • Successful in preventing the disease
  • Patients had to experience smallpox before they could become immune
  • Some died as a result
• Jenner


  Discovered a link between Smallpox and Cowpox
• Edward Jenner


  • Born in 1749
  • Country doctor in Gloucestershire
  • Heard that milkmaids didn't get smallpox, but they did catch the much milder cowpox
• Jenner's investigation


  1. Used careful scientific methods

  2. Discovered that people who had had cowpox didn't get smallpox
• Jenner's test


  • Injected a small boy, James Phipps, with pus from the sores of Sarah Nelmes, a milkmaid with cowpox
  • Then infected him with small pox, but James didn't catch the disease
• Jenner tested his theory

  1796
• Jenner published his findings

  1798
• Vaccination


  Term coined by Jenner using the Latin word for cow, vacca
• Comment and Analysis


  Jenner was important because he used an experiment to test his theory. Although experiments had been used during the Renaissance, it was still unusual for doctors to test their theories
• Jenner's vaccination was Successful despite Opposition
• Reasons for opposition to Jenner's vaccination

  • Some people resisted vaccination
  • Some doctors who gave the older type of inoculation saw it as a threat to their livelihood
  • Many people were worried about giving themselves a disease from cows
• Jenner's discovery soon got the approval of Parliament, which gave Jenner £10000 in 1802 to open a vaccination clinic. It gave Jenner a further £20000 a few years later.
• Vaccination against smallpox was made free for infants

  1840
• Vaccination against smallpox was made compulsory for infants


  1853
• The vaccine was a success - it contributed to a big fall in the number of smallpox cases in Britain
• Comment and Analysis


  The government's attempt to get people vaccinated against smallpox were surprising given attitudes at the time. People believed in a laissez-fair style of government - they thought that government shouldn't get involved in people's lives. The vaccination policy went against this general attitude
• Vaccination


  Jenner didn't know why his vaccine worked. This lack of understanding meant Jenner couldn't develop any other vaccines. This was only possible after the Germ Theory was published, when Pasteur and others worked to discover vaccines against other diseases, like chicken cholera and anthrax