IUBio

Jenner, cowpox, smallpox, and the first vaccine

Gerald Pier gpier at warren.med.harvard.edu
Tue Sep 12 15:42:54 EST 1995


Ann Maria Soler-Rodriguz;

   It is great that you are interested in commemorating the notification
to the world of the potential for vaccination that is ascribed to Jenner,
but, in fact, Jenner did not discover this.  In fact, he basically took
(stole?) the idea from local farmers in Dorset who had already
demonstrated 20 years beforehand the protective effects of cowpox
vaccination against smallpox.  For more details see the following:

Letter from Richard Horton, Assistant Editor of Lancet published in the
British Medical Journal, vol. 310, pg 62, 1995

Plotkin SA and Mortimer EA, ed. Vaccines, 2nd ed. Philadelphia, WB
Saunders, 1994, page 2

Horton, R.  Jabs.  London Review of Books.  Oct. 8, 1992, pgs 22-23

Essentially as Horton writes in his letter to Br. Med J:
"...Edward Jenner was a political opportunist who obtained priority in the
discovery of vaccination (1796) through his reputation...and aristocratic
social standing...  The efficacy of vaccination was already known among
local farmers in north Dorset in the mid-1770s.  Benjamin Jesty, who had
observed the protective effects of cowpox infection among his milkmaids,
persuaded his wife (then age 50) and two sons that they should be
deliberately infected with cowpox material.  He used a stocking needle to
transfer matter from a cowpox pustule on a cow (not Blossom, I'm afraid)
to a scratch made on the arm of each of the members of his family.  These
inoculations were the first recorded vaccinations..."  Dr. Horton goes on
to describe the recognition that Jesty eventually received.

   So what do you think?  Does Jenner deserve recognition?  There are
serious questions about what he did and the recognition he deserves.


Gerald B. Pier
Harvard Medical School

In article <434ffb$2vp at data.interserv.net>, arodri03 at interserv.com wrote:

> On May 14 1796 Edward Jenner, an English physician, demonstrated for the
first time that it was possible to induce protection 
> against  a dangerous disease through immunization. Next year will be the
200 year aniversary of the development of the first 
> vaccine. This vaccine led to the erradication of smallpox in 1979 by
world-wide collaborations coodinated by WHO.
> This is a very important date in Human and Immunology history. I will be
posting more details about Jenner's story. I will also 
> appreciate any comments anybody may have that will enrich this posting.
> Ana Maria Soler-Rodriguez, Ph.D.



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