VACCINATION.

Evening Star, Issue 10851, 8 February 1899, Page 4

VACCINATION.

TO THE EDITOR. Sir,—ls " Sanitas " a parent, that he should " advise those who have not complied with the law to do'so as soon as possible, if not from fear of the deadly disease, at any rate from fear of the penalty of the law"? Does he think that the terror of the law is going to make a fond parent sacrifice his conscientious principles? In spite of all that may be said of me, I unhesitatingly say that I would rather my children ran the risk of falling victims to smallpox, should it become epidemic in New Zealand (which is very tnlikely), than that they should be killed through being vaccinated, or that they should become a burden to themselves and their mothers for years, through suffering from a skin disease brought «n through meekly obeying a law which 'nterferes between parent and child before ib* latter is six months old. With " Humanity," I object to being called "pig-headed" simply because I will not be coerced into endangering the health of my Bonnte Baibns. Dunedin, February 7. to the editor. Sir,—One "Sanitas," in your issue of the 7th inst., writes on the above subject in the most perverse and hysterical style imaginable. A little personal experience of the operation would, I think, modify the zeal of such vaccine enthusiasts. This I would recommend to "Sanitas" along with the consideration of some of the following facts : 1. A royal commission was appointed a few years ago in South Africa to inquire into the causes of the alarming increase of leprosy in that country. This Commission reported that the spread of this loathsome disease was mainly brought about by arm-to-arm vaccination. 2. If vaccination will convey the germs of leprosy from one person to another the presumption is that other diseases, such as consumption and scrofula, may be communicated in the same way. 3. Numbers of cases are on record where blood-poisoning and venereal disease have been directly caused by vaccination. 4. Is there any means, of testing with certainty the purity, or otherwise of any given sample of lymph? If calf lymph is used is there any certain guarantee that the. blood

of the calf was free from the germs of tuber' culosis or other disease ? S. Smallpox is a disease which is practically non-existent in these colonies. What proof is there that the disease cannot be combated by quarantine, isolation, and improved general sanitation? Some years ago when in Melbourne I asked an experienced physician his private opinion on the subject of vaccination. He told .re that for some years he had been a pub'.k vaccinator, but that, some of his oases having turned out very badly, he gave up his appointment, and now rarely vaccinated at all if he could avoid it. Compulsory Vaccination may have been necessary in England half a century ago. Is that a good and sufficient reason for its performance in New Zealand to-day? British legislators have seen good reason to relax the stringency of their vaccination laws, and the sooner We follow their example the bet-. te.—l am, etc., X.Y.Z. Dunedin, February 8;