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197
Dr. Gayton, after quoting a later opinion of Jenner's to the
effect that the protection by vaccination was tantamount to that
of an attack of small-pox, says, "Proofs are abundant already,
and will continue to accumulate, to disprove these statements."
Mr. Marson, in the 16 years following 1836, and when he
estimated the number of persons who had been inoculated or had
Small-pox to be probably about equal to the number of those who
had been vaccinated, found that only 47 persons were admitted
to the hospital suffering from small-pox after the natural or
inoculated disease, whereas there were 3,094 cases of small-pox
after vaccination.
Mr. Sweeting is of opinion that vaccination is decidedly less
protective than a previous attack of small-pox.
At Sheffield, in the 1887-88 epidemic, Dr. Barry found, as
the result of his census, that 18,292 persons, or 6.6 of the
enumerated population of the borough of Sheffield, had had
small-pox prior to 1887. Of these, 23 were attacked again in
1887-88, and five died. This gives an attack-rate of 13 per
10,000 against an attack-rate of 155 per 10,000 in the vaccinated.
The evidence leads us to the conclusion recorded by
Dr. Gregory, the Physician to the Small-Pox Hospital, in 1843,
viz., " that any attempt to institute a parallel between cases of
small-pox after vaccination, and cases of secondary or recurrent
small-pox, must fail."
No hospital supplies so large an experience, extending over a
long series of years, as the London Small-Pox Hospital. We
learn from the figures recorded by Mr. Marson and Dr. Munk,
and the reports of the hospital, that the percentage of cases of
vaccinated small-pox patients to the total admissions has
progressively increased with the increase of vaccination among
the general population, if not in exact ratio, at any rate in a ratio
approximating closely to it.