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the Managers of the Metropolitan Asylum District—upon whom, in their
official capacity, devolved the treatment of a large proportion of the
infected—to collect certain statistical facts, which illustrate the advantages
of efficient vaccination and re-vaccination, as evidenced by the experiences
of the medical superintendents of the several Small-Pox Hospitals under
the control of the Board. The observations of these gentlemen confirm
former opinions on the subject, and establish beyond doubt the mitigating
influences in Small-Pox cases of successful primary vaccination, and the
preventive powers of efficient re-vaccination. The total number of
Small-Pox patients treated in the various Hospitals of the Managers,
from the outbreak of the epidemic in 1876 until the commencement of
the present month, has been 15,171, of whom 11,412 were vaccinated,
and 3,759 unvaccinated, and it is believed that for each case treated in
the Board's Hospitals another was privately attended—hence some idea
may be formed of the magnitude of the epidemic. The total number of
deaths which occurred in the Hospitals during the period under consideration
was 2,677. Of these 1,008 were vaccinated, and 1,669 were
unvaccinated cases. The per-centage mortality upon the whole of the
admissions was, therefore, 17.6, being at the rate of 8.8 per cent. of the
vaccinated, and no less than 44.4 per cent. ef the unvaccinated.
It may be observed that among the 11,412 vaccinated patients admitted
are included the majority of those who stated that they had been
vaccinated, but upon whom no traces of vaccination were discernible.
No case of small-pox has come within the cognisance of either of the
medical superintendents of any person who had been efficiently vaccinated
and successfully re-vaccinated. The nurses and servants employed
from time to time at the various hospitals during the epidemic have
enjoyed almost absolute immunity from infection, and the few—some
half-dozen amongst nearly 1,000-who contracted the disease whilst discharging
their duties had, from some cause or other, escaped re-vaccination
before entering the wards. Experience has therefore irrefutably proved
that were vaccination efficiently petformed in infancy, within the
period prescribed by the Vaccination Act, and re-vaccination successfully
accomplished at puberty, small-pox, instead of being, as it is at present,
a common and extremely fatal disease, would be a comparatively rare
one, and so little fatal, that few, if any, deaths would result from it.
I am, Sir, your obedient Servant,
Oct. 30, 1879.
To Frank Dethridge, Esq.,
Clerk,
Paddington Vestry. W.F. JEBB, Clerk.