Part 2
Reference had been made to the diminution of small-pox in the parish of St. Giles’s. At a meeting in Kentish Town some months ago, Dr. Ross adduced what he thought to be evidence of the effect of vaccination in St. Giles’s. At that meeting he, Dr. Pearce, had combated Dr. Ross’s argument by shewing that the diminished mortality from small-pox was owing to its absence and its displacement by scarlatina.
Dr. Seaton’s statistics had been quoted to-night in proof of the advantage of legislation on the subject. That well paid officer of the Privy Council had drawn up a table for the Epidemiological Society which he, Dr. Pearce, had republished in his essay, and which he begged now to hand to Dr. Routh and Dr. Thomson for their inspection.
_Table_, _showing the annual mortality from small-pox in England in three periods_: (1) _Before the enactment of any vaccination laws_; (2) _After vaccination was provided gratuitously_, _but was not obligatory_; _and_ (3) _since vaccination has been obligatory_:—{15}
DIVISION 1. DIVISION 2. DIVISION 3.
Before the enactment Vaccination provided Vaccination of any Vaccination gratuitously, but not obligatory. Laws. obligatory. Year. No. of Year. No. of Year. No. of Deaths. Deaths. Deaths. 1838 16,268 1841 6,368 1854 2,808 1839 9,131 1842 2,715 1855 2,525 1810 10,431 1847 4,226 1856 2,277 1848 6,903 1857 3,936 1840 4,645 1858 6,460 1850 4,666 1859 3,848 1851 6,997 1860 2,749 1852 7,320 1861 1,320 1853 3,151 Average 11,944 — 5,221 — 3,240 Annual Deaths.
The table was compiled for the purpose of showing that legislative measures to provide and enforce vaccination, have been effective in diminishing the mortality from small-pox.
The year 1838 was the most fatal year, from small-pox, in the present century. The table is commenced with that year, _while former years are omitted in which the death-rate from small-pox was low_, (for it had not prevailed severely since 1825). Hence the average mortality is swelled to 11,944. So much for the first division.
The third division is supposed to prove that the decrease of the mortality from small-pox is due to compulsory vaccination. It must be remembered however, that in the second division there are three epidemic visitations included, while in the third division there is only one. Moreover, if the years 1862–3–4–5, be added, the average annual deaths for the period 1862–65 amount to 5,421, thus—
Year. No. of Deaths. 1862 1,628 1863 5,964 1864 7,684 1865 6,411 — 5,421
Dr. Seaton attributes the diminished mortality from small pox to compulsory vaccination, closing his account with 1861, which is the year of lowest mortality in the table. How will he account for the subsequent increase of mortality from small-pox under a more vigilant enforcement of the Act of Parliament?
In 1863 it amounted to 5,964; and it rose to 7,684 in 1864; _which was the most fatal year in regard to small-pox for twenty-four years_. If vaccination be really “protective,” and if the gradual diminution of the mortality from small-pox down to the year 1861 was consequent on vaccination having been made compulsory, how, and why was the mortality of 1864 from that disease no less than 6,364 _in excess_ of the mortality of 1861?
Dr. Routh has quoted Dr. Seaton with a view of illustrating the contrast between the last century and the present in respect to the mortality from small-pox.
He has told you that prior to vaccination, the annual death-rate of small-pox per million of population was 3,000. This was a rough estimate made by Sir Gilbert Blane and Dr. Lettsom. The value of this “estimate” may be judged of, when I tell you that prior to 1838, there were no complete statistics of mortality. Mr. Simon in his “Papers on Vaccination” at page lxviii says, “Till after 1837, _there could be no authentic knowledge of deaths by small-pox_.”
Dr. Farr in the 30th annual report of the Registrar General says, quoting Dr. Watt, of Glasgow, a child had a better chance of reaching its tenth year in the last eighteen years of the last century when small-pox formed 20 per cent. of the whole mortality than it has now, when small-pox mortality is only two per cent.
No one disputes that small-pox is less prevalent now than it was a century ago, but what gain is there? Dr. Farr says, “it is useless to bar the door against one form of zymotic disease, as small-pox by vaccination, while the _causes_ of zymotic disease are suffered to remain.”
In 1863 scarlatina destroyed 30,000 in England, a mortality of 1,800 to each million persons living. In 1869 and 1870 the probability is that the mortality from scarlatina will reach 40,000 annually, shewing a death rate per million of 2,000, while small-pox will probably not exceed 70 to a million.
Small-pox was a scourge in Europe a century ago. Now, scarlatina is the scourge, and this will continue. One or other form of zymotic disease will continue to exist while the causes which develope them remain. You gentlemen, who advocate vaccination as a preventive measure are in error—you begin at the wrong end—you aim not at taking away the cause, but prefer to contaminate the body with one disease, to prevent the subject from taking another, which is the result of filthy habitations, unclean towns, and bad sanitary arrangements.
It has been disputed to-night that diseases are induced by vaccination; will it be denied that erysipelas is a common—a frequent result of the process? What are the facts? Erysipelas, which, prior to vaccination, was a disease incident to adult life, especially to middle age, is now a disease of infant life. In the Registrar General’s returns, you will find in the six years 1862 to 1867, there died of this disease 10,635, including all ages from birth to 80 years; of that number no less than 3,261 died in the first year of life, _the year of vaccination_, while 3,904 died under five years of age. This frightful mortality of infants is the direct consequence of vaccination; a natural result; indeed, Jenner tells us that, that vaccination is alone protective, which is attended by erysipelas; while the spontaneous cow-pox, which is _unattended_ by erysipelas, is not protective. Yet when children die of erysipelas following vaccination, the deaths are certified “_death from erysipelas_,” while the truth is concealed. The death should be certified properly, DEATH FROM VACCINATION. But when an inquest is held in this parish, under the coronership of Dr. Lankester, on a child of Mr. Emery of Great Portland-street, although the evidence adduced to the jury clearly shewed that the child died in consequence of vaccination, efforts are made to conceal the fact; for while the jury unanimously returned a verdict “_died from erysipelas caused by vaccination_,” the coroner’s copy deposited at the Registrar General’s office, Somerset-house, certifies the additional words “_death by misadventure_.” {19} And with what object were those words added, but to screen the operator, by whose vaccinating hand another child also lost its life (probably with the same lancet) on which the coroner for Westminster, Mr. Bedford, held an inquest. I do not say that Dr. Lankester intentionally suppressed the truth, to save his professional brother, but I do say, that it is highly dangerous to the community, to have a _medical_ coroner, whose leanings in favor of his profession may lead him into partial verdicts. The duty of a coroner is to hear evidence, and direct the jury as to the _law_, not to give opinions with a professional bias. Compulsory vaccination may be defined to be manslaughter by Act of Parliament.
So much for one disease, Erysipelas. Let us now come to another frightfully increasing disease of infant life, Diarrhœa. I have, during the last twenty years in which I have given my attention to this subject—vaccination and its effects—observed the frequency with which vaccination of infants is followed by a fatal kind of diarrhœa. Enteritis of infants has without doubt increased and is increasing.
I was not surprised, therefore, to find in the twelfth report of the medical office of the Privy Council, just published, a paper by Dr. Seaton on vaccination in Paris, in which at page 176, occurs the following passage:—
“_In some cases the vaccinated calves have suffered from diarrhœa_.”
At page 178, “In Depaul’s seventh and eighth experiments, for example, _the calves suffered severely from diarrhœa_.”
Another passage, page 178, shows that diarrhœa is an accompaniment of the process; “the health of the calf, however, affects the character of the eruption, for it has been observed that _when diarrhœa happens in the course of its evolution_, the pustules, although they rise as in the healthy calf, are smaller in size, and less full.”
And thus infant mortality is increased by the infliction of a disease of the brute creation, which in the “course of its evolution,” causes diarrhœa.
The medical press has lately teemed with articles calling attention to the prevalence of small-pox, in Paris, it is stated that small-pox prevails there because vaccination is not compulsory. While it is quite true that the Legislature of Prance has passed no such disgraceful and tyrannical vaccination acts, as those which exist in England,—yet vaccination is almost universally adopted. Mr. Smee, the surgeon to the Bank of England, and examiner of candidates for life assurance, lately, in a letter to the “Times” newspaper, stated that his large experience enabled him to state that to find a Frenchman unvaccinated was an exception. The 12th report of the medical officer of the Privy Council tells us that in France it has been decreed, under the direction of the Academy of Medicine, by ministers, that “No infant should enter an orphan asylum, an hospital, a primary school, a lyceum, or a government college without a certificate, of vaccination.”
The Army and Navy of France are vaccinated, and vaccination is enjoined, if not enforced, on all who hold government situations. Besides this, it is forced upon the poor by a rule that “_those who refuse to have their children vaccinated_, _shall have no public assistance_.”
The fact is, that vaccination has failed in Paris, as in every other city. Let the medical gentlemen opposite, look to the paper of Dr. Seaton, whose cooked statistics they have quoted to-night; the paper to which I have before alluded, presented to the Lords of the Privy Council in the 12th report of Mr. Simon, and at page 188, they will find the following passage:—
“Striking exemplification of the danger of confiding in animal vaccination during an outbreak of small-pox has been given during the present epidemic in Paris, no doubt a large share of the _unsuccess_ which has _notoriously_ attended the practice, has been due to the hurry, and other unfavorable conditions under which it has been carried on. _But apart from this_, _and where the conditions have been favorable_, THE FAILURES HAVE BEEN QUITE REMARKABLE.”
I unhesitatingly affirm that vaccination from whatever source, whether from the heifer direct or from arm to arm, or even the heel of the greasy horse, which Jenner defined to be the _true source of protective matter_, is not only a failure—it is a delusion, an imposture, and the law which enforces it at the bidding of the medical department of the Privy Council, is a disgrace to the Statute Book of England, and ought to be repealed. For the reasons I have given, after nearly twenty years of attention to this important subject, I support the resolution.
Mr. Glidden made a few observations in support of the medical men who had spoken in advocacy of vaccination, expressing his surprise at the want of modesty in the last speaker, who, as a member of a learned profession, spoke disparagingly of his medical brethren, and applied the term “cooked” to statistics on the other side, while he produced a multitude of statistics of his own.
The chairman here interposed stating that Dr. Pearce head only produced the official statistics of the Registrar General. The resolution was then put and carried with only four dissentients.
Mr. R. B. Gibbs, Hon. Sec. to the Anti-Compulsory Vaccination League, moved “that a memorial be presented to the Lords of Her Majesty’s Privy Council, praying them to suspend the vaccination laws until the inquiry, promised by the Government, had been made,” and said, that similar requests had been made several times, and that so far back as 1856, the government had promised a committee of the House of Commons, which promise was evaded. Instead of a committee an _exparte_ investigation was made by sending a string of questions to a number of interested doctors, who, of course upheld the system. This course was much the same as if the late Royal Commission on Trades Unions had written to the secretaries of the various unions, to enquire how they worked. If a question had been asked of Broadhead, respecting the Saw-Grinders’ Union, of course, he would have reported that it was working satisfactorily.
Mr. Gibbs said, that the League would be satisfied with nothing less than a full investigation of the Medical Trades Unions. He then adverted to the case of the Rev. H. J. Allen, who had appealed to the Court of Queen’s Bench against a second conviction, which conviction had been upheld by the Court, and Mr. Allen left to pay a lawyer’s bill of over £30. He trusted that the lovers of freedom would assist him in his difficulties. Mr. Gibbs then referred to the important testimony, lately adduced by medical gentlemen in Manchester and elsewhere, that the evil results of vaccination were often apparent after “successful” operations with “pure lymph,” and reminded the audience that it was from the effects of such an operation, that Sir Culling Eardley, and many others had died. In view of such uncertainties, Mr. Gibbs argued that it was cruel to enforce the prisoning of the community.
The resolution was seconded by Mr. MacHeath, who in an interesting and amusing speech alluded to the “beastly” practice of vaccinating the human species.
The resolution was carried unanimously.
Dr. Caplin moved a vote of thanks to the Chairman, which was heartily responded to, and the meeting, which was most effective, was brought to a close.
* * * * *
* * * * *
* * * * *
DEATHS FROM SMALL-POX IN SWEDEN, 1821–1852. {23}
Date. Deaths. Date. Deaths. 1821 37 1837 361 1822 11 1838 1,805 1823 39 1839 1,934 1824 618 1840 650 1825 1,243 1841 237 1826 625 1842 58 1827 600 1843 9 1828 257 1844 6 1829 53 1845 6 1830 104 1846 2 1831 612 1847 13 1832 622 1848 71 1833 1,145 1849 341 1834 1,049 1850 1,376 1835 445 1851 2,488 1836 138 1852 1,534
* * * * *
ADVERTISEMENT.
Preliminary Medical Education AT PROVINCIAL HOSPITALS.
BY WILLIAM PAUL SWAIN, F.R.C.S., _Surgeon to the Royal Albert Hospital_, _and Eye Infirmary_, _Devonport_.
Price Sixpence.
FOOTNOTES.
{11} See page 23.
{12} Since the meeting was held the quarterly returns of the Registrar General has appeared, shewing that in the present year the mortality of England has considerably increased.
{15} Transactions of the Epidemiological Society, vol. ii., part 1.
{19} Three fourths of the jurymen have in their own hand writing repudiated the words “death by misadventure” and declare that the verdict returned did not contain those words. The remaining members of the jury have not yet been consulted.
{23} From page 92, Dr. Pearce’s Essay on Vaccination.