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Evening Star, Issue 14689, 5 October 1911, Page 4

An eminent physician onco declared that a man's attitude towards Vaccination, the vaccination controversy was likely to furnish a fair criterion of his judicial calibre in relation to other questions, and that a persistent arrti-vaccinationist would usually be found to have a general tendency to mental ilightiness and the development of kinks. Without fully endorsing this suggestive dictum—which bears heavily on those enlightened legislators, Messrs E. H. Taylor, Laurcnson, Isitt, and Witty—we may just remark that (as is customary on such occasions) a great deal of arrant nonsense was talked in the House of Representatives on Tuesday when the topic of vaccination incidentally cropped up in Committee of Supply. The member for Thames is an old performer in this particular role of pernicious faddism, and perhaps we ought not to be surprised at the ' perveraeness of his allusion to the "quackery of vaccination." It should be hardly necessary to point out that the boot is on the other foot with a vengeance. The anti-vaccination craze is probably the most . mischievous form of unscientific quacksry. extant at the present time. L«t

no one suppose that in, saying this we are indulging in arrogant dogmatism, unsupported by convincing evidence. We are merely stating the bald conclusion which must inevitably be reached as the result of candid examination of the available data. Mr Isitt is reported to have said that the statistics in most parts of tho world were "dead against vaccination." He might as reasonably have declared that •the statistics in most parts of the world were dead against the notion that two and two make .four. We are glad that there was one member ready and able to speak on the subject with authoritative viycr. Di- Te Eangihiroa demolished the statements of the anti-vaceinationists from the scientific point of view. The remarks made by Messrs Taylor and Laiirenson had filled him with amazement. He could not understand the silly ideas of the men who argued that a treatment that saved thousands of lives should be done ;wray with. The great bulk of responsible medical opinion was in favor of vaccination, and the few who were against it were regarded .as freaks, or men with a mental kink.

Dr Te Eangihiroa added that the people of New Zealand had lulled themselves into a sense of falso security in regard to the matter. This is quite true, though Mr Laurenson appears to hold the curious view that the wholesale neglect of the precaution furnishes a tolling argument against vaccination. Less than 20 per cent, of the children born in the Dominion are vaccinated ; ergo, vaccination is a delusion and a snare: such is the Laurensonian logic. Mr Witty's argumentative method is equally original. The member for Riccarton (who at least deserves credit for keeping the cradle full) appears to have told the House that he had live vaccinated children and five who were not vaccinated ("and he hoped they never would be"), and the latter were just as healthy as the former! We can quite believe this statement, though it is utterly irrelevant. It 13 not a question of ordinary health : it is a. question of immunity from a specific danger. The salient consideration is •that, in the event of an epidemic of smallpox, vaccinated persons are much less liable to contract the disease than are the unvaccinated. Nor > is this all; there is another point of scarcely inferior importance. When the vaccinated take the disease (and it is not claimed that tho immunity is absolute), they almost invariably take it in a comparatively mild form. A few years ago. in Dr Mason's time, the Public Health Report contained a number of photographic illustration?. Hideous, forbidding pictures they were—calculated to haunt one's dream---—and yet we say deliberately that it is a pity they could not be circulated in every household in tho Dominion. They would give the people of New Zealand some idea of the terrible scourge to which their forefathers were continually subject, and which Jenny's beneficent, discovery (foil >wtng the less effective practice of inoculation) has, to such a largo extent, conquered and banidled. Inter alia, two photograplts were shown in' parallel columns : two children suffering from smallpox—vaccinated and nnvaccinated. The vaccinated child looked merely unwell-that was all you could say ; while the unvaceinaU>d—but there ' after years the memory of the thing is nauseating. As wo have often ?aid, we do not wish to exaggerate the nature of the danger as regards New Zealand. Happily (having regard to the false security of which Dr Te Rangihirea ?pea!;s) the peril of a smallpox epidemic is comparatively remote. Smallpox is a dirt disease, and the progress of sanitary science shares with vaccination the distinction of being its almost irresistible foe. Still, there is,a danger—sufficiently serious to make it almost a criminal act to neglect the available precaution. If a "scare" took place, there would fas on previous occasions) be a rush to the doctors and public vaccinators, and perhaps a shortage of lymph, and something like a panic. For the majority of the people (we are glad to believe) are not convinced adherents of the anti-vaccinationist quackery ; they merely ignore the danger, lulled, as Dr To Eangihiroa says, in a sense of false security. One other point in conclusion. The family doctor is not blameless in this matter. It after the birth of a child he made a point of mentioning and emphasising the duty of vaccination, the percentage of parental neglect Would be much lower than it is.