1818.—From the foundation of this Establishment in 1808 to the present year there have been vaccinated 52,253 persons at the stations in London. Only four of these are yet known to have had Smallpox afterwards, and these were never very seriously ill.
1819.—The testimonies of some of our correspondents concur in showing that great numbers of persons who had been vaccinated have been subsequently seized with a disease presenting all the essential characters of Smallpox; but that in the great majority of such cases, the disease has been of comparatively short duration, unattended by symptoms of danger. In several of these cases, however, the malady has been prolonged to its ordinary period, and in eight reported cases it has proved fatal. It appears to us to be fairly established that the disposition in the vaccinated to be thus affected by the contagion of Smallpox does not depend upon the time that has elapsed after Vaccination, since some persons have been so affected who had recently been vaccinated, whilst others who had been vaccinated eighteen and twenty years have been variolated, and exposed to contagion with impunity.
1820.—It is true that we have received accounts from different parts of the country of numerous cases of Smallpox having occurred after Vaccination, and we cannot doubt that the prejudices of the people against this preventive are assignable (and not altogether unreasonably, perhaps) to this cause. These cases the Board have industriously investigated, and though it appears that many of them rest only on hearsay evidence, and that others seem to have undergone the Vaccine Process imperfectly, yet after every reasonable deduction, we are compelled to allow that too many still remain on undeniable proof to leave any doubt that the pretensions of Vaccination, to the merit of a perfect and exclusive security in all cases against Smallpox, were at first admitted too unreservedly.
1825.—That a considerable number of persons have had Smallpox after having been vaccinated, we are ready to admit; although of cases of this kind, a large majority are found on examination to be without that test of the operation being performed successfully and effectually, which all agree to be necessary to perfect security. Vaccination, therefore, it will be said, does not afford an absolute and perfect security. We do not present it to the world with that pretension, but we declare it to be the least imperfect of the resources we possess for encountering the disease.
1827.—It is true, cases are reported to us very often of the occurrence of Smallpox after Vaccination; but we have reason to believe that the number of those who fall into this safe, though sometimes severe disease, after Vaccination, is not greater than that of those who formerly died by Inoculation whilst that practice prevailed.
1833.—Of an equal number of persons vaccinated and variolated, only so many of the former will be capable of taking the Smallpox afterwards, and that in a safe degree of the disease, as are found to die by the latter.
1836.—If 300 children be vaccinated, one will be susceptible of Smallpox afterwards, but only in a mild and perfectly safe form, whereas if 300 be variolated, one will surely die.
As evolutions from inner consciousness, the statistics of Variolation and Vaccination under 1827, 1833, and 1836 are noteworthy. They illustrate the facility of the Board at the discovery of what was thought ought to be true.
DEVELOPMENT OF A FABULOUS SALVATION.
1811.—Previous to the discovery of Vaccination, the average number of deaths by Smallpox within the London bills of mortality was 2,000 annually; whereas during 1811, only 751 died of the disease, notwithstanding the increase of population.