The Daily News. WEDNESDAY, FEBRUARY 4, 1903. VACCINATION AND COMMON

Taranaki Daily News, Volume XXXXV, Issue 30, 4 February 1903, Page 2

The Daily News. WEDNESDAY, FEBRUARY 4, 1903. VACCINA TION AND COMMON

SENSE. • Da. J. M. Mason, the Chief Health i Officer for the Colony, has forwarded to ui a very interesting, yaluable, and icstructire pamphlet confining the full text of an address, delivered at the Mansion House, London, in March, last by Sir T. D. Ackland, M.D., Oxon., Physician to St. Thomas £lo«pital. Sir Theodore Dyke Ackland tells the tale about vaccina'ion so simply and dispassionately that, as Dr Mason siys in his preface to the pamphlet, " it has been •bought wise to publish it in handy form for the p3oph of New Zealand." Dr Mason emphasises the fact that " there is in no sense any desire on the part of the Health Dapartmsnt I to force vaccination upon our citizens agaiust thsir expwsssd wish." The veica of the peeple as heard in the House of Representativ«s, has said that any father or mother with a conscientious objection against vaccination need not have his er her child vaccinated. Therefore, until that cause is removed from the statute book, nothing but an appeal to the common Bense of the people can be permittfd. And Or Mason says, he do-s not wi*h it different. He points out, as worthy of Bote, that here in Nsw Zsaland wehiva anticipated the authorities in the Old Country. In the last paragraph of h's p*per, Dr Ackland urges upjn the Local Government Board to undertake the supply of calf lymph—the enly thing wanting, he suggests. Here it is illegal to use lymph other than that supplied by the Government. Dr Ackland, it need scarcely he said, is an earnest advocate of vaccination, and in his paper he deals exhautively with the whole subj.ct. Moreover, he sp»aks with some confidence, ps for SBven years he was Medical Officer to the Royal Oom-mii-sion on Vaccination, and was engaged in making inquiries ieto vaccinal , injuries throughout the length and: j breadth of the kingdom; During that' j period Many millions of v«ccin»tiops' were performed, and he asserts that he' ■ never s*w or heard of an authentic , ca»e of smallpox rssulting from vacci-; nation. We canaet, in the limitid space at our disposal, present Dr.' lAcland's arguments, in detail. Dr. ! Mason s»ys the paper has been puolished for the benefit of the people, and ws hope to see it scattered broadcast throughout the land. As instancing I the fairness and force of Dr. Acland's' arguments, we may cite his comments in regard to the objection which is frequently used against vaccination, Tit., that the harm done by it acd the j risks which it involves are so gre;st th .t tbete is eo justification for a practice productive only of evil and powerless for good. Dealing with this, and wi h the other objection " th»t vaccination does not prevent smallpox, but actually, causes the disease," Dr. Acland says : ■ " If you wi'l have patience with up, f will endeavour to show you how very far from the truth" both these state- \< ments are. B.fere doing so, however, I should like to say that we know, *v=m j' if all goes well, that a vaccinated child ' suffers something, and is an increased ■ care and anxiety to an often over- : worked mother. No one can sym-' 1 pathise more than I do with the trouble ; and di.t ess which may thus come to j mother »nd child through the second ' week of won a normal vaccination. * Sometimes, when all "dees go wall— ' when there is inflammation of the r.rm,' or u'ceration of the pocks—the burdon ' thus imposed on the mother is heavier, [ and the suffering of the child is greater] c and in some few isstances the injury « may bs severe, [t cannot b.s denied a that in the case of a workiDg-man ' Buch trouble in the house may o

be a Birious oue» and it inu-t be looked upon as a Sacrifice, which he is asked to make for the good of; the 8-.ate as WBll as for the good of the' child. To retura to the consideration of vaccinal injuries. Calculating fiom the cases which were brought under the notice of the Royal Commission on Vcccination during the years 1889-96, and from the cases inquired ibto during 1888-91 by the Local Government Bjard, it would appear that there was death or serious injury .in one case in abcut 14,000 primary vaccinations. " You m*y say thateventhisamount of harm ought not to be, and the fact that it does occur is a powerful argument against vaccination. Before accepting this conclusion you must take into consideration that more than half (57.6 per cant.) of these cases resulted from' preventable causei—-teat is, from one or other of the various forms of inflammation. Further, when you consider the case with which the vaccine pocks may be injured, rubber), or fouled, and when you consider the terrible condiions under which, unfortucately, thousands of our fellow work-ing-men have to live, it is hardly to be wondered at that an open-wound like vaccination does sometimes go wrong." After remarking apositely "that all thing* ocoasionilly go wrong in this; imperfect world," Sir Theodore adds : " When first I began to consider these questions seriously, I cast about for something with which the lisk caused by vaccination (infinitesimally small though it really i>) might fairly be compared, and I came to the exclusion that the use of anaeitheties (chloroform and ether) was, on the whole, the greitist blessing which my profussion bad over been able to roofer on suff.riug mankiuJ. Now, as you are all aware, a certain number of deaths cccur every ye.\r through the use of anaesthetics ; this is quite unavoidable The percentage number of deaths from chloroform is nearly seven tiaies as great as that from the complications or accidents of vaccination. The deaths from ether are considerably fewer than from chloroform, but, even so, the total directly traceable to anaesthetics is considerably greater than that resulting from vaccination, tt is interesting to compare the numbers of vaccinal ir juries with the fatality from smallpox (even in a mild epidemic) where the practice of vaocina'ion has been allowed to lapse, In Leicester, duriDg the outbreak of 1891-92, 100 unvaeeinated children were attacked, of wboxi twelve died. Thus in this community (with an unvaccinatsd child population), with all the boasted safeguards of isolation and sanitation, as many children died frem smallpox as, according to the calculation given above, might ba estimated to die or to suffer from serious injury amongsh a like numbsr of children (100) in 1680 years, or in about 169,908 venations, During this time epidemic only two vaccinated children und r ttn years of age were attacked by smallpox, neither of whom died. In a severe epidemic, such as that at Gloucester (1895-96), no fewer than 279 unv.ccinated children under ten y*ara of age died out of 680 attacked (41 percen .), Suoh fatality would not occur in less than three million primary vaccinations, and a very little calcul*ti-m will show that the risk of a fatal igtue amongst those attached was jut 6000 tiai«« is great as fiom vaccination. Comment is unnecessary, but 'be ficts are deserving of stjous a'udy. They I s ■ m to me to sho.v quite clenly that although there is a certain ■ imunt of risk in vaccination, the risk is so small that it is one whioh should be readily faced if it can be shown that vaccination is for th« go.il nf he individual and tbe benefit; of iho State. A great deal has been written and sud about the serious nature of the risks, but they are in fact very small, and are such as the members of my» own profession readily incur for themselves, their wives, and their children, for though they knew them bitter thin anyone else can know them, they judge them to b , as th y a »■, iruigoifkanfc as compared >■uii is** of smallpox. It is the duty of every one of us, as far as in us lies, to prevent oursilvaß from becomiog the centres >.f infection. As you are the judges i this case, and have to decide for yourselves whether vaccination is capable of affording protection against smallpox, it • is only right that you should consider the credibility of the witnesses wbo bring forward their evidence for or against the practice. Everyone will, I think, allow that if they want a go id pair of boots they should go to a -boo' nwker, and if they want a good loaf of breid they should go to the baker; and similarly it might be expected that those whe wish to learn about smallpox and its prevention would be wise to go to those likely to possess tbe most accurate knowledge of the disease —namely, those who have spent their lives in the practical study of smallpox. You will find that the unanimity of opinion expressed by those who have so spant their lives as to the effect of vaccination is very striking, and that those who are opposed to vaccination are, almost without exception, those who have no very practical acquaintance with smallpox. There are armchair generals even in medicine, who prefer to sit at home acd deal out what they consider dasj tractive criticism to those win are in i the midst of the fight, rather than to bj up and doing something for the good of the individual, and tbe welfare of the community." Comment on the above is superfluous. The enlightment of the people is evidently Sir Theodore's chief object-. The paper bris'le* with figures, and somo simple hut significant diagrams are given. The great object the doctor appears to have in view is to teach that the so called riski of vacoination are really very smal l , and that vaccination and re-vaccination should be unive sally practised if the people are to ba adequately protected.