VACCINATION AND SMALLPOX.

Dominion, Volume 4, Issue 1037, 28 January 1911, Page 3

VACCINATION AND SMALLPOX.

Sir,—lt will, I think, bo universally ad-, mitted that if tho above case on the ship Knight of the Garter ho in truth ono of smallpox, tho health authorities could no nothing better or more adequato than to isolate, and disinfect, and to quarantine tho vessel. But why, may I ask, do more? Why not rely upon sanitation? AVhy vaccinato either patient or crow? Have they no personal rights that claim respect? Havo they no voice or choice in tho matter, no self-ownership? AVhy should vaccination bo tho only surgical operation not left to the option of tho patient? The threadbare assertions reported in tho "New Zealand Herald" of Saturday, Janu»ry 14, that the unvaccinatcd aro in peril, and a peril to others, that in ■ caso of epidemic thoy must bo compelled to bare their arms' to avoid tho dread malady, and that those contemplating toreign travel should be vaccinated as a precaution—would deserve respect if supported by a single inslanco in which vaccination had prevented or arrested an epidemic, per so, that is, entirely apart from resort to sanitation. I submit, that if tho history of the last century has proved anything at all— if it proved the unspeakable and horrors of aggressive war; if it has proved that drunkenness is ruinous, gambling demoralising, sensuality desradmg—it-has also demonstrated that vaccination is n delusion and a snare—that so far from protecting from, it propagates, smallpox, and that, on tho contrary, wherever sanitary methods aro relied upon, there, in proportion to their adequacy, smallpox is kopt from the doors, and' becomes a thing unknown. Tako as illustrations, Leicester among cities, Germany among nations. Or, tako England, our dear old Fatherland, and noto how, as vaccination declined and sanitation increased, smallpox also'declined, so that, to-day, and for at least a year past, it lias been free or very nearly so from "the beggar's (lis-, ease"! If it bo asked: Why, then, does the medical profession in "general still preach and practice vaccination? Ask, rather, why any class, priests or physicians, cling to "vested interest," to a professorial property, to a Slate-paid dogma? Hence it is that following the leaching of tho schools, the traditions of the elders, unable to make investigation through Uie multiplicity of studies and absorption in professional technique, doctors are upon this subject, of all classes, Ihe most prejudiced and the least capable' of making a free and disinterested judgment. And yet, it. is not too much to believe that this great profession is honeycombed with profound scepticism as to the prophylactic claim of-vaccination. Store than ono medical Anti-Vaccination Lcaguo has beou already formed, and, in fact, the majority arc very chary in advising it. They know too much about -'t. They, at least, know that towards the

end of the eighteenth century the thou Society of Physicians sanctioned inoculation, but, finding it actually diffused the disease it was supposed to prevent, this same bodv of physicians secured in 1«0 its prohibition, under a penalty of ono month's imprisonment. It was an attempt to stamp out tho disease, by stamping it. in. History repeats itself. That same attempt is mailo to-day! Tho use of variolous matter is forbidden by law in New Zealand, and yet there is no room to doubt that it is variolous matter that is passed through the chosen and tortured calf and distributed as "pure calf lymph." England still mourns and has placed on the grave .of Florence Nightingale her richest, rarest tributes of love and honour as the mother and Queen of Nurses—the soldiers' friend. Was it by "vaccination" or by any form of seninftherapy she saved those hundreds of lives in Crimea? Never! It was by Sanitation and Sympathy. It was not by drawing upon and weakening the "vis medicatrix naturae," but by placing it on tho best conditions possible for its preservation and its recuperative efforts. In tho presence of her grand simplicity and faith in "the Nature cure"— that is, in natural health conditions—and her magnificent success, I for ono count it worse than childish ignorance, nay, as criminal stupidity, to infect and poison the puro ■ life-stream with tho noisome compound falsely called "pure calf lymph." It is true, sir, that as belief in Church miracles and in witchcraft declined and died by the silent swelling tide of knowledge, and the nurture of a more humane spirit, so the heart/mind, and conscience, tlie commonsense and consciousness of men and women everywhere—distrust and reject the nostrum that professes, by ? filth product, to prevent a filth disease, and so "Learning dawned, Its light arose,' And thus the Truth assailed its foes! J ' -I am, etc., EDWIN COX. Cambridge, January 17.