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36
Q. Small-pox in pre-vaccination days claimed about 80 % of its
victims among children, but since infantile vaccination
was inaugurated has the mortality been very largely
transferred to the latter periods of life—when the
protective power of infant vaccination has largely worn
out?
A. Yes.
Q. Among those attacked, do those who have been vaccinated
have milder attacks and furnish fewer deaths than those
who have not been vaccinated?
,. A Yes.
Q. Does vaccination well and properly performed afford greater
protection from Small-pox than vaccination insufficiently
or ill-performed?
A. Yes.
The Commission collected abundant evidence to warrant an
emphatic answer in the affirmative to each of these questions, and
all those who read the report in an impartial spirit will agree that
it constitutes a tower of evidence which is quite impregnable.
Germany presents a fine object lesson of the value of vaccination.
Surrounded as it is on three sides by others among whom Small-pox
is always rife, it enjoys a freedom from the disease which is unequalled
in any other country. There, vaccination is compulsory before the
end of the year following that in which the infant is born, and
re-vaccination is enforced on leaving school and on entering the
army. From the Official Returns it appears that in 1895 there were
only 27 deaths from Small-pox in a population of about 45 millions,
14 of which occurred on the frontiers, and at least 5 others from
a case imported direct from Russia. Those who so foolishly argue
that the question of the extermination of Small-pox is one of
sanitation alone will scarcely contend that Germany compares
favourably with England in this respect.