Vaccination a Delusion: Its Penal Enforcement a Crime: Proved by the Official Evidence in the Reports of the Royal CommissionWallace, Alfred Russel
Science
Vaccination a Delusion: Its Penal Enforcement a Crime: Proved by the Official Evidence in the Reports of the Royal Commission
Wallace, Alfred Russel
Vaccination
The next three diagrams, V., VI., and VII., show small-pox mortality in
Sweden, Prussia, and Bavaria—countries which at previous enquiries were
adduced as striking examples of the value of vaccination. They all show
phenomena of the same character as our own country, but far worse as
regards epidemics in the capitals; that of Stockholm, in 1874, causing a
death-rate more than 50 per cent. higher than during the worst epidemic
of the last century in London! The diagram of small-pox and zymotics
in Bavaria is given merely because the statistics were brought before
the Commission as a proof of the beneficial results of vaccination in
well-vaccinated communities. It was _alleged_ by Dr. Hopkirk that almost
the whole of the population were vaccinated, and _admitted_ by him that
of the 30,742 cases of small-pox in 1871 no less than 95·7 per cent. were
vaccinated! The epidemic was, however, less severe than in Prussia, again
showing the influence of density of population, less than one-seventh of
the Bavarians inhabiting towns of over 20,000, while one-fourth inhabit
similar towns in Prussia; but we see that during the latter half of
the period chosen small-pox greatly increased, and the other zymotics
remained very high, indicating general insanitary conditions. And this
case was specially brought before the Commission as a proof of the
_benefits_ of vaccination! In their _Final Report_ the Commissioners omit
to point out that it really indicates the very reverse.
We then come to the two cases that afford most conclusive tests of the
absolute uselessness of vaccination—Leicester and our Army and Navy.
Diagram VIII. shows the death-rates from small-pox and from the other
zymotics in LEICESTER during the period of official registration,
together with the percentage of vaccinations to births. Up to 1872
Leicester was a fairly well-vaccinated town, yet for thirty-four years
its small-pox mortality, in periodical epidemics, remained very high,
corresponding generally with the other zymotics. But immediately after
the great epidemic of 1872, which was much worse than in London, the
people began to reject vaccination, at first slowly, then more rapidly,
till for the last eight years less than 5 per cent. of the births have
been vaccinated. During the whole of the last twenty-four years small-pox
deaths have been very few, and during twelve consecutive years, 1878-89,
there was a total of only eleven small-pox deaths in this populous town.
Public-domain text, read in full here on John Shaqi.
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