View report page

32
public vaccination stations involves a risk of infection being
communicated. The Act requires that the public vaccinator shall
give to the parent or guardian at least twenty-four hours notice of
his domiciliary visit, and " glycerinated calf lymph or such other
lymph as may be issued by the Local Government Board." shall
alone be used. Although the risk of humanised lymph was so
trifling that medical men have habitually used it in their own
families, this provision will do much to allay the ill-founded fears
which have arisen largely as a result of the exaggeration and misrepresentation
of anti-vaccinators. Lymph which has been thus
treated with glycerine has its keeping powers very much improved,
while at the same time the storage of the lymph with glycerine
destroys extraneous organisms. Every precaution, moreover, will
be taken to ensure that the original lymph is taken from calves
which are quite free from disease in any form.
Section II. of the Act is popularly known as "the conscience
clause," and provides for the acceptance of the plea of conscientious
objection as a means of relief from the infliction of a fine upon those
who refuse to allow their children to be vaccinated. With the
exception of this conscience clause the rest of the act only came
into operation on January ist, 1899, and the Act remains in force
for five years, when the whole subject must again come up for
consideration by Parliament.
Though Parliament and the Ministry and the Royal Commission
on Vaccination agree with the medical profession in believing that
vaccination is essential to the prevention of Small-pox, they allow
those who allege themselves to be conscientious objectors to vaccination
to neglect to protect their offspring, and thus to constitute themselves
a menace to the health of the community. The indifference
to vaccination which is implied by the insertion of such a clause must
tend to swell the list of those who attach no value to vaccination,
and although the percentage of children who are already unvaccinated
in England and Wales has reached the alarming figure of 25%,
the number of defaulters will probably grow and with them the
risks of epidemic Small-pox. It is therefore increasingly necessary
for those who appreciate the great value of vaccination to protect
themselves against this impending danger.
In 1895 the worst vaccinated unions in London were Bethnal