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is no doubt true, but it is true for both periods alike. It does not
appear to us materially to vitiate the comparison for the purpose
of disproving the allegation that the great increase of syphilis
during the last twenty years is due to vaccination.
Even if it can be shown that in some instances syphilis has
been inoculated by vaccination, the conclusion would still remain
that this cannot have been so to any substantial extent.
We take next Cancer. There can be no doubt that the
mortality from Cancer shown by the registered causes of deaths
has considerably increased in recent years. This disease is, it
must be remembered, one to which persons of advanced years are
specially subject. The young are seldom its victims. And the
increase of mortality from it has, for the most part, affected adults
and principally old people. There has been an actual decrease in
the mortality from the disease of those under five years of age.
It may well be that in some cases vaccinated children have
suffered fatally from Erysipelas who, but for the operation of
vaccination, would not have been attacked by the disease. This
is a point we shall have to consider presently. But the evidence
is, in our opinion, conclusive to show that there has not been
during the last forty years any material increase of deaths from
Erysipelas owing to vaccination.
Passing on to tabes mesenterica and scrofula, we find that
the mortality from these diseases, as returned to the RegistrarGeneral,
shows an increase during the last forty years. On the
other hand, the mortality from allied diseases, such as Hydrocephalus
and Phthisis shows a decrease. Some part, and it is
impossible to say how much, of this increased mortality in the
case of the two first-named diseases, and of the decrease in the
two last-named, is apparent only and not real, and results no
doubt from better diagnosis leading to a transfer of cases from one
class to another. On this point again it is useful to resort to the
experience of Leicester. The increase of deaths under one year
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