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Smallpox and compulsory vaccination are attracting considerable attention just now, and apropos of the recent action of the health authorities of Atlanta in favor of enforcing the local vaccination law, we clip the following from the Literary Digest. The authorities quoted differ very much with the Atlanta doctors on the question, but we incline to believe the latter are right. If Jenner’s discovery is not responsible for disarming the smallpox all over the world, what is?The work of the London Society for the Abolition of Compulsory Vaccination is outlined in a pamphlet by William Tebb, F. R. G. S, in which he gives the story of fourteen years’ struggle for emancipation from the vaccination tyrannv. Vaccination was made compulsory in England and elsewhere on the apparently well-founded assumption that Jenner's discovery is an absolute protection against small-pnx, and one of the most beneficent discoveries of science.The agitation against its compulsory enforcement was wide-spread and strong from the outset. Much of this may have been due to prejudice, but it was not long before intelligent observers saw reason to believe that painful and loathsome diseases were communicated to previously healthy children by means of vaccine lvmph drawn from tainted children. The medical profession was, however, unanimous in support of the new practice, the law was enforced vigorously and hundreds of parents underwent the martyrdom of fine and imprisonment rather than i subject their children to the ordeal.At the beginning of 1880, a society was formed “to expose the miserable Jennerian delusion.” The task was an uphill one. Vaccination had the almost unanimous support of the medical profession, and of the ablest scientific and statistical authorities throughout the kingdom. Moreover, with the single exception of The Echo, all the London papers regarded the anti-vaccinators as contemptible cranks. But the organization gained in strength and influence, and in 1885, the men of Leicester turned out in a s body, and made such a formidable ; demonstration aganist the compulsory laws that it was thought prudent to 1 suspend them. Three years later, Dr. 1 Charles Creighton, an eminent pathologist, was selected by the editors of “The Encyclopedia Britannica” (ninth edition) to undertake an exhaustive investigation of the vaccination question. Though starting with a strong bias in favor of the popular medical j dogma, the result was to convince him ( that vaccination is devoid of scientific foundation, and was, in short, a popu- ’ lar medical delusion. This was follow- i ed by Dr. Crook shank’s “History and Pathology of Vaccination,” in which the practice of vaccination was charac- ( terized as “an idol of the market-place.” , With the accession of medical experts -to its ranks, the society has renewed ‘ its labors with determined energy, but popular fallacies die hard, and the antivaccinators look forward to some stern fighting yet, before they may hope to see the compulsory vaccination law repealed, and the medical profession ready to relegate the practice to the limbo of exploded delusion. Meantime the society has abundant fight in it, and our author reminds his readers of “the indefeasible right of a parent to protect his defenceless offspring from danger.”A royal commission of inquiry on vaccination has been in session since April, 1889. It was appointed “to expose the distortions and misrepresentations of the enemies of vaccination.” These enemies, however, see reason to hope that the commission will recommend the modification if not the abolition of the law of compulsory vaccination.Some of the radical liberals are ac
Newspaper Details
Atlanta Sunny South
Atlanta, Georgia, US
Sat, Mar 10, 1894
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Anonymous
USA 30 Aug 2023
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