Chapter VII: Part 7

There is one Government Report on vaccination in the Philippine Islands, which is often quoted by vaccinators to show the utter harmlessness of vaccination, which claims that from three to five millions of vaccinations have been performed on the population of the Philippines, _without a single injury or death_! Now, this reckless report might be made correct if slightly amended by the Goddess of Truth to read as follows: “Three to five millions vaccinated without a single injury or death”--_which has ever been honestly acknowledged_! It is, of course, shamefully false on its face to say that three to five millions of vaccinations were ever inflicted in the Philippines or anywhere else without any injuries or deaths; and the mind which can accept such a statement without a big logical and moral squirm does not understand the real nature of vaccination, the facts of vital statistics, or the first principles of mere mathematical chances, proportions and probabilities, as I will now show.

In the first place, a million is such a gigantic number that any person who has any disrespect for or trifles with it is not fit to discuss this subject. For example: if a man were to live for a million days he would have to be about three thousand years old! Whereas the average life of a man is much less than fifty years or about one-sixtieth of a million days! Now, if a man were to subject himself for the whole average lifetime of fifty years, or one-sixtieth of a million days, to the ordinary, benign, and necessary conditions of breathing air, drinking water and milk and eating food, he could not possibly do this without at some time contracting some disease and possible death from these perfectly normal, necessary, and benign conditions of breathing, eating and drinking, as most of our diseases and infections are admittedly contracted through these three benign sources! Yet our Government-trifler in millions wants us to believe that you could inflict on the human body--millions of times--not a purely benign action, but the purely and doubly malign act of vaccination, which consists in first wounding the body and then injecting into this wound a virulent septicemic infection, without causing a single injury or death! In other words, the doubly malign act--wounding and infecting the human body with a complex pus infection--is utterly harmless and less injurious than the purely benign acts of breathing, eating and drinking, which demonstrably cannot be practised for one-sixtieth of a million days by any human being without a possible serious injury or death!

Here is surely the “reductio ad absurdum” which shows that such a reckless statement of the harmlessness of vaccination by the millions is, of course, a stupid and shameful medical falsehood on its face and is pretty close to being a medical crime on the people, as any honest doctor or intelligent layman must know who has given any serious consideration to this subject, or who has any idea of what vaccination is, or who knows anything of disease infections, vital statistics and the laws of mere mathematical chances and probabilities.

Indeed, every competent doctor knows that you could not subject the human body to a mere pin scratch for a million times without causing several serious injuries or possible deaths from resulting infections. And every competent doctor and student of vital statistics knows also that there are actually more deaths caused every year by mere pin scratches and trifling cuts, wounds and abrasions, resulting in lockjaw, septicemia, erysipelas and other infections than from the dreaded smallpox itself.

Is it not, therefore, rather strange, Mr. President, that vaccination should be reported as so utterly harmless in the distant Philippines, where we can not easily get at the records, when we know it is so deadly in the near-by England and America, where the accessible records show that it causes, frequently, more deaths than smallpox, as I have already proved? For example: the great English Commission on Vaccination found that deaths from vaccination were sometimes as high as seventy deaths per million vaccinated. This is twice as high as the mortality from smallpox in the United States, which for five years, from 1901 to 1905, including our last great epidemic period of 1901 and 1902, averaged only thirty-four deaths per million population! See U. S. Mortality Statistics for 1907, page 40. The Reports of the Registrar General of England for 1906, 1907 and 1908 give a death-rate from infantile vaccination in those years which runs as high as forty-two deaths per million children vaccinated! Here we see that, according to some of our highest statistical authorities, vaccination is not harmless, but is so very harmful that its ratio of mortality per million vaccinated is sometimes twice as great as the ratio of smallpox mortality per million population, and including an epidemic period!

We therefore think, Mr. President, that these points and facts make sufficient answer to, and refutation of, the shocking medical lie that vaccination is perfectly harmless, and, per contra, prove that general vaccination is actually more dangerous to public health and human life to-day than natural smallpox, just as that great medical blunder of a past century--smallpox inoculation--was proved to be more dangerous than the natural disease and was finally prohibited by penal law. And I feel sure that compulsory vaccination will follow the same course and be legally prohibited for the same reason in the present century.

HEALTH DEPARTMENT FALSEHOODS

As a lifelong student of this subject I have become convinced that the whole cult and practice of general public vaccination and particularly all compulsory vaccination, like all great intrenched evils, has originated in falsehood, has continued in falsehood, and now exists on both falsehood and concealment, viz.: falsehood as to its absolute efficiency and certainty in protecting the individual against smallpox; falsehood as to the necessity of general vaccination to prevent smallpox epidemics; and gross falsehood as to its perfect safety and freedom from danger to human health and life.

Now, I do not think that I have ever seen a grosser illustration of the truth of this charge than can be found in the special article on Vaccination published in the _Monthly Bulletin_ or _Health News_ for February, 1914, issued by the New York State Department of Health at Albany, which contains what I believe to be shocking falsehoods, fallacies, and exaggerations which even a tyro in the investigation of this subject could easily refute, as I will now show. All these fallacies have been issued with an air of gospel truth, to instruct the public, and to try to justify the extreme efforts of our department officers and medical doctors to force compulsory vaccination on every child and adult in this State as not only absolutely necessary for public health, but as the only known means to prevent smallpox epidemics, and as being an operation which is wholly beneficial and entirely safe and harmless to human health and life. I shall now give examples of the chief and worst of these medical falsehoods and follow with their refutation, as a duty clearly due to public truth and right.

FIRST FALSEHOOD: This official Bulletin at page 48 tells us concerning the alleged efficiency and necessity of vaccination as follows:

“Nothing but vaccination can save from smallpox.... Cleanliness
and general sanitation exert absolutely no influence upon its
prevalence.”

This is about as shocking, absurd and false as it can be, and coming from our highest State health officer is certainly not creditable to our public health service, but is so obviously absurd and untenable as to refute itself on its very face. This paragraph tells us, in effect, that dense human overcrowding, with personal and public filth spread everywhere, no sanitation or isolation anywhere, and every case of smallpox left loose and at large to spread by direct contact to every child and adult and thus infect every one right and left, as in the old unsanitary times of big and frequent epidemics--all this, our Health Commissioner coolly tells us, would not make a bit of difference in the spread of the disease! And, per contra, the prevention of all these vile unsanitary conditions of barbarous times, with or without vaccination, would have no effect whatever to reduce the disease!

Now, of course, every person of any common sense or knowledge simply knows that these propositions are absurdly false on their face, and that we need pay no further attention to them, except to show by such horrible examples how foolish and desperate the falsehoods are that are resorted to by some doctors and health officers to try to force this dangerous medical evil of compulsory disease on every child and adult, and that on such falsehoods it is essentially based. Every unbiased student of this subject knows that efficient sanitation and hygiene have been the most effectual means for preventing and reducing all diseases and promoting public health during the last half century and that, as a matter of fact, no serious reduction of smallpox or typhoid fever has been effected in modern times except through general sanitation and hygiene, with or without vaccination.

SECOND FALSEHOOD: The next major fallacy in this State Department Bulletin relates to the alleged perfect safety of vaccination, as follows:

“There is not the slightest risk in the process of vaccination
when it is carried out with clean virus (now guaranteed by
Government inspection) and when the vaccination itself is kept
clean. ‘Sore arms’ come from dirt getting into the vaccination,
not from the vaccine itself.”

Now, if the man who wrote this falsehood knows anything extensive on this subject, he must know that what he states here is not true. And he knows also that the government does not really guarantee any virus, and that no such thing as “clean” virus is now, or ever was, made or can be made; that is, no virus without some, or many, dangerous suppurative disease germs of one kind or another, known or unknown, which will not be likely, some time or other, in some persons, to bring about a dangerous infection of the system with possible serious or fatal injury, and that, as a matter of fact, such infections are occurring constantly in children and adults from the various existing brands of “clean,” “inspected,” and “certified” virus now in use. Furthermore, as to this evil being caused only by “dirt” getting into the wound, this audacious writer must also know that this dangerous or fatal infection can and does come into the wound both directly as a “primary” infection from the virus itself, and as a “secondary” infection from “dirt” in or about the wound, and he must know very well, if at all competent to write on this subject for public instruction, that one kind of infection is about as common and as fatal as the other, and that both are almost equally chargeable to the operation of vaccination itself, so that to contend otherwise is merely a cowardly evasion of the truth, as has been fully proved by the shocking exhibits of vaccination horrors shown herein.

FALSEHOODS FROM THE ENCYCLOPEDIAS

From the article on Vaccination in one of our leading American books of reference, the “International Encyclopedia,” published by Dodd, Mead & Co. in 1904, I take this surprising gem of falsehood, as follows:

“_There is absolutely no danger of transmitting disease by
means of bovine virus._”

Please note that the author of this falsehood is not content with saying merely that there is _no danger_, but _absolutely_ no danger. And when he was asked for an explanation or “authority” for this outrageous statement, this is what he answered:

“You ask for the authority for the statement in the
International Encyclopedia: ‘There is absolutely no danger of
transmitting disease by means of bovine virus.’

“I cannot refer you to an authoritative work on medicine where
this statement can be found, but it is commonly repeated by
professors of medicine to students, and was put away in my
memory as an established fact many years ago.”

The rank stupidity and falsity of the statement first quoted will be evident when we recite the fact that _the very basic purpose and function_ of the bovine virus is _to transmit the disease cow-smallpox from calves to man_, as an alleged preventive of another disease, natural smallpox, and yet this high medical authority, writing for the information of the trusting public in one of our leading books of reference, solemnly tells us that it is absolutely impossible to transmit any disease by it, and that this doctrine has been preached to students for years _as an established fact_! If, however, he meant to say that it is absolutely impossible to transmit any other disease besides cow-smallpox or “vaccinia,” this statement would, of course, be equally false. Even of such generally harmless and benign mediums as _air_, _water_ and _milk_, it could not be sanely or truthfully said by any one that “_there is absolutely no danger of transmitting disease_” by them, for we all know that some of the most common and fatal diseases are often transmitted by these very benign mediums, air, water and milk. But to make such a reckless statement about a dangerous complicated _disease culture or virus_, a revolting _extract of pustules_, is not only grossly _untruthful_, but it is hardly even _sane_; yet this is a good sample of some of the statements with which our _high medical authorities_ have misled the trusting public mind. And speaking of “sanity,” it may provide us with a rather laughable emotion, at this point in our very grave subject, if I now cite the fact that at the time this high medical authority made this most false and absurd statement, as to the utter harmlessness of vaccination, he actually held the most high and significant office of--“_President of the New York State Commission on Lunacy_”!

THE ERRORS IN THE BRITANNICA

The article on Vaccination in the Encyclopedia Britannica, in the old edition preceding the last or current edition, was written by Dr. Chas. Creighton of London, a well known English doctor who, by long study, has become an opponent of vaccination, and is the author of several books exposing its fallacies. When Dr. Creighton first got the commission to write the article for the Encyclopedia he was a pro-vaccinist, like many other doctors, but to fit himself to write a full and impartial article which would give both sides of the subject he resolved to make a thorough study of it, pro and con. This study convinced him of the dangerous nature of vaccination to health and life, its limited or exaggerated value as a protection against smallpox, and its illogical or unscientific basis as a medical remedy; and his critical article on this subject, when it first appeared in the leading Encyclopedia, made a sensation in the medical world and has been a thorn in the side of pro-vaccinists ever since.

Now, what will impartial students of this subject say when I cite the fact that the article on Vaccination in the last or current edition of the Britannica is written, not by a man who is impartial and professionally disinterested in the subject, as was Dr. Creighton, and who tried to give both sides of the subject freely, but, on the contrary, by a man who is actually _a manufacturer or inventor of vaccine virus_ and has, therefore, necessarily, a professional interest and bias to conceal the failures and dangers of vaccination as far as he can? Surely, the editors of the Britannica made a great moral and logical mistake when they selected any man to write so important an article on a much disputed subject in this great book of reference who had any professional or other interest or bias in this subject. Now, the biased and interested author of this article in the last edition is none other than Dr. S. Monckton Copeman of London, a strong pro-vaccinist, who claims to be the original inventor of the so-called “_glycerinated virus_” now in general use for vaccination. The idea of adding glycerine to the virus is to kill the many dangerous disease germs or infections it is known to contain, but to preserve the germ of smallpox, or “cowpox” intact. This is, of course, an admission that before the use of glycerinated virus vaccination was very dangerous and likely to cause many infections in the human body, but since the adoption of glycerinated virus--Dr. Copeman’s invention--it is now claimed that vaccination is rendered safe and harmless. This is, of course, a false claim, as I have already shown, and will further show in a succeeding paragraph.

Now, this greatly biased and one-sided article of Dr. Copeman--the maker or inventor of glycerinated virus--in our greatest Encyclopedia, is surely a good illustration of my charge that the trusting public mind is constantly misled, whether intentionally or unintentionally I know not, by some of our highest medical authorities on the whole subject of vaccination, and particularly as to its alleged harmlessness. Thus, when Dr. Copeman, who is regarded as one of the leading authorities on modern vaccination, comes to consider the dangers of vaccination, he heads his paragraph, “Alleged Injurious Effects,” thus implying that the injuries are only “alleged” and not real, and he goes on to argue or imply that--due to his invention--the dangers and injuries are now trifling or negligible, but tacitly admits or implies that before his invention of glycerinated virus the dangers were very serious, whereas, with his invention, vaccination is now practically safe and harmless.

Now, what must we think of the truth of this claim that vaccination with glycerinated virus is now safe and harmless, when, at the very time that its inventor made or implied this claim in the pages of the Encyclopedia, in the year 1910 or 1911, the vital records of his own country, in the reports of the Registrar General of England for those two years, showed that there were eight deaths from vaccination in the year 1910, and fourteen deaths from vaccination in 1911! And these fatal vaccinations were, of course, all made with the glycerinated virus as, practically, no other kind is now used! These vaccination deaths were all in little children under five years and they exceeded the deaths from smallpox in the same age class by fourfold in 1910 and by threefold in 1911! That is, the deaths from vaccination under five years were eight in 1910 and fourteen in 1911; while the deaths from smallpox under five years were two in 1910 and five in 1911! The total deaths from smallpox in all ages were nineteen in 1910 and twenty-three in 1911.

The four years preceding 1910 show even a worse record for vaccinal mortality than the record of 1910 and 1911, so that the record of those two years cannot be claimed as anything special or unusual. For example, the reports of the Registrar General for 1906, 1907 and 1908 show a total of only six deaths for these three years from smallpox in the infant ages under five years--the ages most susceptible to smallpox--while for the same infant ages there is a total of fifty-three deaths for the same three years from cowpox or vaccination--nine times more infant deaths from vaccination than from smallpox! In 1909 there is reported only one infant death from smallpox and eleven infant deaths from vaccination!

This shocking record of vaccination deaths clearly shows that the famous glycerinated vaccination of Dr. Copeman, which he virtually claims to be so safe and harmless, in our greatest book of public reference, is actually from three to ten times more fatal to children than natural smallpox, as proved by the vital records of his own country and by the highest statistical authority in the world! Surely, Mr. President, in such crushing counter facts as these, my charge of a shocking deception of the public mind, either intentional or unintentional, on the merits of vaccination by our highest medical and literary authorities, is flatly proved.

THE ERRORS OF DR. M. J. ROSENAU, A HIGH MEDICAL AUTHORITY, ON THE RELATIVE HARMLESSNESS OF VACCINATION

We now come to a different style of medical falsehood on the effects of vaccination which, while honestly admitting its dangerous nature, yet tries to minimize the dangers as much as possible and reduce them to the relatively immaterial. This is a shameful equivocation of the truth and an absurd contradiction of facts, as I will now prove out of the mouth of the apologist himself. I now refer to the statements of Dr. Milton J. Rosenau, who is one of our highest authorities in this country on vaccination and other special medical subjects. He was for several years Director of the United States Hygienic Laboratory at Washington, where he made many investigations into the nature of vaccine virus, its impurities, dangers, etc., and has made official reports on different subjects for the said Laboratory and for the United States Public Health Service. He is now professor of Preventive Medicine and Hygiene in Harvard University, and is the author of several books, one of which, “Preventive Medicine and Hygiene,” published by D. Appleton & Co. in 1914, I will now quote from. In this book, on page 19, under the head of “Dangers and Complications” of vaccination, Dr. Rosenau states as follows:

“However, vaccination is not always a harmless procedure; it
must be looked upon as the production of an acute infectious
disease, and, although the disease is always mild and trivial,
it must not be treated as trifling. The chief danger lies in
the fact that we have produced an open wound, which is subject
to the complications of any wound. Even a pin prick or a razor
scratch may result in death. While the aggregate number of
deaths resulting from the complications of vaccination may be
considerable, the aggregate of the individual risk is so small
as to be disregarded, especially when proper precautions are
taken.”

Here, surely, are some honest admissions and some queer denials, and I would now kindly ask you, Mr. President, to re-read this quotation carefully, and I think you will find it an interesting verbal and psychological study, showing the typical sophistry and casuistry of the whole vaccination cult which well illustrates a witty saying of the late Elbert Hubbard, who was a great student and opponent of vaccination, viz.: “The great trouble with vaccination is that it vaccinates the mind.” And he meant by this that the poison which the vaccinators put into the blood of their victims seems to react morally on themselves so that it poisons and blinds their minds and renders them unable to see their own shocking absurdities and mendacities in their false excuses and defences for the serious evils of vaccination. The great Gladstone was reported to have said that he was led to oppose compulsory vaccination not so much by the arguments of the anti-vaccinists as from the falsehoods of the vaccinators.

You will note that all the medical authorities previously quoted assert positively that vaccination is perfectly safe and harmless and never causes any serious injury or death, except what might be due to the carelessness of the vaccinated persons themselves, which statement I have proved by overwhelming evidence to be a most outrageous medical falsehood. Per contra, the last medical authority quoted honestly admits that vaccination is not always harmless and that it always consists in inflicting an acute infectious disease on the human body, but that this inflicted disease practically never does any harm and may be disregarded. In other words, the policy of this medical authority and high representative of the vaccination cult, in the statement quoted, seems to be to honestly admit all he dare, and gracefully deny all he can! And for this honesty we must give him a layman’s thanks, for he does really admit a great deal, and where he attempts to deny he really admits more, as I will soon show.

Now, it is obvious that the infliction of “an acute infectious disease,” deliberately and extensively, on the human body, is a vicious and dangerous practice, per se and prima facie, and cannot be continued indefinitely without serious injuries, as I have already proved, and hence Dr. Rosenau contradicts himself at the very outset in his statement or apology for vaccination. In his next phrase he makes the still more surprising statement that this inflicted disease is “_always mild and trivial_,” which assertion is undoubtedly a falsehood! And Dr. Rosenau must know as well as any doctor or layman in this country that this assertion is false, and per contra that this inflicted disease--vaccination--is sometimes very severe and fatal and far worse than natural smallpox itself, and that it often causes more annual deaths than smallpox, as I have already proved by overwhelming evidence and by the highest statistical records in the world! I would, therefore, here respectfully suggest that Dr. Rosenau make some apology to his readers for this falsehood or mistake, and correct this statement as soon as possible in the next edition of his book.

To emphasize and dispose of this serious error of Dr. Rosenau I will now show out of his own mouth how he stultifies and contradicts himself, and logically admits that vaccination is not “always mild and trivial,” but is often quite dangerous and fatal. For example, he says:

“And although the disease is always mild and trivial, yet it
must not be treated as trifling.”

This phrase, just quoted, is, surely, a rich verbal and logical study of medical sophistry and equivocation. Vaccination, this medical champion tells us, is always a “trivial” disease, but it is not a “trifling” disease. This is morally and logically equivalent to telling us that vaccination _is trivial_ and it _is not trivial_! In other words, he asserts in one breath what he denies in the next, or contradicts himself in successive breaths! This is so, because the dictionaries show that the two words “trifling” and “trivial” have exactly the same meaning and are synonymous and identical, so that “trivial” is defined as “trifling,” and “trifling” is defined as “trivial.” This, therefore, morally and logically, means a confession out of his own mouth that the inflicted disease, vaccination, is not always either trivial or trifling, but is often very dangerous and deadly, which is, of course, the exact and demonstrable truth, and the scholarly Dr. Rosenau is the last man who can plead ignorance of this truth. Indeed, in another paragraph of his contradictory statement, he absolutely acknowledges this serious danger of vaccination while apparently trying to conceal or deny it. For example, he makes this conclusive and crushing admission that:

“While the aggregate number of deaths resulting from the
complications of vaccination may be considerable, the aggregate
of the individual risk is so small as to be disregarded.”

Now, if the aggregate number of deaths from vaccination is “_considerable_,” then it is clearly proved, out of his own mouth, that vaccination is not always mild or trivial, but just the opposite, viz., _frequently very dangerous and deadly_, thus again proving the case against vaccination out of the mouth of its own defenders! As to the quibble or sophistry that “_the aggregate of the individual risk is so small as to be disregarded_,” this is also a fallacy and falsehood, because this cannot be really true if the aggregate number of deaths is so “considerable,” and particularly not when we have shown that the deaths from vaccination frequently exceed the deaths from smallpox, as this proves that the individual risk from general vaccination is far greater than from natural smallpox, and, therefore, in the long run, vaccination is as much to be avoided as smallpox if not more so.

Webster’s Dictionary gives three meanings for “Considerable,” as follows: “Worthy of consideration”; “notable”; “rather large in amount.”

The Comprehensive Standard Dictionary gives the meaning of “Considerable” as: “Of noteworthy size, quantity or importance.”

It will therefore be seen that Dr. Rosenau, necessarily and logically, admits that the deaths and injuries from vaccination are not “trivial” but “rather large in amount,” and “of noteworthy size, quantity or importance,” thus proving our case out of the mouth of our opponents.

JENNER’S GREAT FALSEHOODS. THE ORIGINAL MENDACITIES OF VACCINATION EXPOSED

No chapter on the mendacities of vaccination would be complete without including the great foundation and monumental falsehoods of Dr. Edward Jenner, who was the alleged “discoverer” or inventor of “Vaccination,” by which term is meant the inoculation of cowpox from cow to man and thence from arm to arm, in distinction from the old direct smallpox inoculation from human to human; and it may now be interesting and profitable to devote a few paragraphs to these great falsehoods of the arch-vaccinator himself.

Jenner’s original claims for vaccination were stated, positively, in his Petition to Parliament March 17, 1802, asking for a reward for his alleged “discovery” in these words:

“That _your petitioner, having discovered_ that a disease which
occasionally exists in a particular form among cattle, known
by the name of the cowpox, admits of being inoculated on the
human frame with the _most perfect ease_ and _safety_, and is
attended with the singularly beneficial effect of _rendering
through life_ the person so inoculated _perfectly secure from
the infection of the smallpox_.”--See “History and Pathology of
Vaccination,” by Dr. Edgar M. Crookshank, London, 1889, page
173, Vol. I.

Now, every proposition in the above statement is a shocking falsehood, as can be easily proved by a few moments’ consideration. In the above quotation the emphasis is mine but the words are Jenner’s, and I have emphasized the words to show clearly where the rank and glaring falsehoods are which make this short statement a very tissue of falsehoods, as will soon appear.

In the first place, it was a downright falsehood for Jenner to claim that he had “_discovered_” that a disease known as “cowpox” could be inoculated on the human frame and that this inoculation would act as a preventive of smallpox, for it is obvious to every student of the history of vaccination that Jenner made no such original “discovery,” but that this “discovery” was made by the milkmaids and dairy farmers of rural England who had long known and used it, and this “discovery” was given by them to Jenner, who then falsely claimed it as his own “discovery” and finally got a reward of thirty thousand pounds from Parliament for this false claim!

Thus does History show us that vaccination commenced, at its very outset, with gross falsehood and also in what would be called in our day a gigantic piece of medical “graft,” and it has been continued on a similar basis, more or less, ever since.

The second great falsehood in the original claim of Jenner was the shocking and reckless statement that the cowpox was perfectly harmless and could be inoculated on the human body with “_perfect safety_,” which false claim has been kept up ever since by the mendacious successors of Jenner, as I have already shown. This claim of the “_perfect safety_” of cowpox was, of course, _perfectly false_, for not only were some of Jenner’s own experiments and tests on patients harmful, but his whole scheme of arm-to-arm vaccination was soon proved to be so dangerous that it was long ago abandoned and prohibited like its evil predecessor--smallpox inoculation--and, for that reason, is not used to-day, being replaced by what is known as “Bovine Vaccination,” which is direct inoculation of so-called “cowpox” from cattle to man instead of from man to man or arm to arm as used by Jenner. Now, this modern “Bovine” vaccination I believe to be even more dangerous than the old Jennerian arm-to-arm type, because it involves the extensive diseasing of two classes of animals, cattle and mankind, and has been the cause of deadly epidemics in both classes, as already proved, which was not known under the old system, and it is also guilty of now causing more deaths almost every year than natural smallpox itself, particularly among little children, as I have already proved beyond question.

The third great falsehood in this tissue of Jennerian mendacity is the claim that one vaccination rendered the vaccinated person “_perfectly secure_” “_through life_” from “_the infection of the smallpox_.” This was, of course, a most reckless and absurd claim on its face, for how could Jenner, with a few experiments and tests extending over a few years, declare with any honesty, or with any logical or scientific warrant, that cowpox inoculation gave _absolute security from smallpox for life_? This reckless claim was, of course, soon proved to be a rank falsehood by the wide-spread failure of vaccination to protect from smallpox as soon as the vaccinated persons were exposed to actual infection or epidemic conditions where they readily contracted the disease, as they do to this day notwithstanding their vaccination! A new apology had therefore to be invented for this wholesale failure of vaccination soon after its first adoption, and this was made by abandoning the false claim of unlimited life protection from one vaccination and substituting the modified claim of a limited protection for seven years--more or less--and the consequent necessity of frequent or periodical re-vaccinations to get any continued or reliable protection from the operation.

Now Jenner’s original false and absurd claim of unlimited or life protection from one vaccination was probably partly due to his ignorance of the real nature and history of smallpox and his credulous adoption of the old fallacy and superstition, in common use, that one attack of smallpox gave sure immunity for life from a second attack, which proposition never really had any scientific basis in theory or fact, as it has been repeatedly proved that smallpox may, and often does, occur two or three times in the same person, whether vaccinated or unvaccinated, and that there is no regularity or certainty in the alleged protection given either by smallpox or vaccination, but that immunity depends largely on sanitary, hygienic and constitutional conditions. In fact, some students seem to think that the person who has once had smallpox is more likely to have it again than one who has never had the disease! It was, therefore, at this first demonstrated failure of vaccination to protect from smallpox that Jenner’s chief assistant, Dr. James Moore, wrote a very interesting little book called “The History of Small Pox,” London, 1815. The chief purpose of this book was to apologize for the failure of vaccination to protect from smallpox, as originally falsely claimed by Jenner, by showing that even smallpox does not protect with certainty for life or any other period, but that the same person may have smallpox two or three times in succession, instances of which are cited all through the book, thus making the ingenious or crafty plea for vaccination that it cannot be expected to give any more protection than smallpox gives; and therefore reliance must not be placed on one vaccination alone for life, but protection can only be obtained by re-vaccinations repeated at frequent intervals of a few years!

It will thus be seen that Jenner completely abandoned his false and reckless claim of _perfect protection_ from smallpox _for life_ by _one vaccination_, for which he got his big graft or money prize from the English government; but, please note, he did not make this retreat or acknowledge his great mistake until after he had pocketed his big reward of thirty thousand pounds for his shamefully false claim of the unlimited protection and perfect safety of vaccination!

SHORT DURATION OF VACCINAL PROTECTION AND NECESSITY OF FREQUENT RE-VACCINATIONS NOW ADMITTED. DANGER FROM SUCH REPEATED VACCINATIONS GREATER THAN FROM SMALLPOX

We have seen in the preceding chapter how the original false and reckless claim of Dr. Jenner for _absolute protection for life from one vaccination_ was soon abandoned when put to the actual test of smallpox epidemics and that a modified position was then taken in the necessity of re-vaccination in certain periods of about seven years, more or less. This limited claim has, however, been also abandoned in recent years and the term of alleged vaccinal protection has been getting successively shorter and shorter, until it has now fallen to the ridiculously short protective period of only six months or a year for each vaccination or re-vaccination! This seems to be the present position of our most recent medical authorities and advanced vaccinators, which is not only a great shrinkage in protective claim but is very interesting and significant in that it closely approaches, and admits, the rational position of the anti-vaccinators who have contended consistently and persistently from the days of Jenner that vaccination, at the best, gave merely a limited immunity of only a few months, more or less, and, in some cases, in very susceptible persons, gave no immunity; and that frequent and repeated vaccinations are more dangerous as being multiple and cumulative infections of an artificial or inflicted disease than beneficial as the preventive of a natural disease.

To show the present position of advanced pro-vaccinators on this point and their virtual agreement with anti-vaccinators as to the very limited period of vaccinal protection and the necessity of frequent repetitions, I will now quote from a recent high medical authority, viz., Dr. Robert Olesen, of the U. S. Public Health Service, stationed at Manila in the Philippine Islands, which is supposed to be one of the greatest fields in the world for practical experience with smallpox and vaccination.

In an elaborate article by Dr. Olesen printed in the _New York Medical Record_ of March 4, 1911, he makes these very serious statements as to the necessity of frequent re-vaccinations and the short duration of protection from each vaccination, as follows:

“THE NECESSITY FOR RE-VACCINATION.--There is abundant reason
for believing that a person who has been successfully
vaccinated is absolutely protected against smallpox during
a period varying from six to twelve months, probably the
latter. After this time his immunity may or may not continue
indefinitely....

“In the absence of means of determining accurately the length
of perfect resistance it is best to re-vaccinate once a year.”

Now here we plainly see that this Government Expert after long experience in the fertile field of the Philippines admits clearly and positively the very limited protective power of vaccination, so that it is practically evanescent in duration, or extends over a few months only, or at most can not, or should not, be relied on for sure and safe protection longer than from six months to one year! And for this reason Dr. Olesen carefully advises that “_it is best to re-vaccinate once a year_.”

Now, surely, this modest position of Dr. Olesen as to the short duration of protection and the necessity of re-vaccination _once a year_ is very similar to the position of the anti-vaccinators, but very different from the positive claim of Dr. Jenner on which vaccination started and for which he got his big prize or “graft” of thirty thousand pounds for the grossly false claim of his alleged “discovery” that _one vaccination_ would give _absolute protection_ from smallpox _for life_!

THE DANGEROUS “VACCINATION CREED” OF THE CHICAGO BOARD OF HEALTH EXPLAINED AND CONDEMNED

I will now give another great authority on vaccination, viz., the famous and dangerous “Vaccination Creed” of the Chicago Board of Health, issued in 1906, and still in use, which limits the protective power of vaccination still more than Dr. Olesen and makes it absolutely dependent on multiple or doubly repeated vaccinations to the point of “saturation,” as follows:

“After many years of experience with smallpox and vaccination,
the Chicago Department of Health hereby declares:

“First: That true vaccination--repeated until it no longer
takes--ALWAYS prevents smallpox. NOTHING ELSE DOES.”

It may be now noted that the first and essential article of this creed, printed with its big emphatic capitals, positively states that the only vaccination that protects against smallpox is a duplicated, successive, repeated or multiple vaccination--“_repeated until it no longer takes_.” This means that there must be at least two or three successive vaccinations or multiples of them before any “protection” is obtained, that is, at least one or more successful “takes” and one subsequent vaccination which fails to take! In other words, we must vaccinate repeatedly until it takes, and then vaccinate repeatedly until it fails to take, to get any protection; and this, in some cases, may of course require from two to four or six successive vaccinations! And yet this is the only kind of _redoubled_ vaccination which this famous, or infamous, creed gravely and emphatically tells us in full and loud capitals “ALWAYS” prevents smallpox and that “NOTHING ELSE DOES”! And while Dr. Olesen tells us that one successful vaccination, repeated at least once every year, is a fairly reliable protection against smallpox, yet this “Chicago Creed” positively tells us that such “successful” yearly vaccination is no good at all unless followed at once by another vaccination _which is not successful_! What do you now think, Mr. President, of the absurdity and confusion in these vaccination theories? And what do you think of the great personal repulsiveness and great medical danger of these theories in calling for so many and such frequent inoculations of disease virus or blood poison to give alleged protection from the so-called dangerous disease of smallpox which ordinarily kills less people every year than lightning and which in an epidemic year kills less than ordinary measles or whooping-cough kills every year?

Now while such wholesale and repeated or redoubled or saturated vaccinations for every person, every year, would undoubtedly be a most profitable thing for vaccinating doctors and vaccine makers and would extend the use of vaccine virus _ten to one hundred fold_, yet it is very doubtful whether this would be any benefit to public health. On the contrary, this would be the most grave menace to private and public health that could be conceived; for, whereas, the limited vaccination now practiced actually causes more deaths per year than smallpox, particularly in little school children, what would happen to our precious children and our brave soldiers and sailors if we were to adopt the horribly dangerous theories of multiple or redoubled or “saturated” vaccination every year for each person, according to the “Creeds” of Dr. Olesen and the Chicago Board of Health, which these experts assure us is the only way to get any certain protection from smallpox?

Now if only one vaccination were required for life protection, it would, obviously, not involve as much risk from vaccinal infections or “complications,” such as Lockjaw, Septicemia, Meningitis and Pneumonia; but if the vaccinations have to be repeated every few months or a year as Dr. Olesen directs, or, furthermore, if they have to be redoubled and repeated “_until it no longer takes_,” as in the “Chicago Creed,” then the infecting risk is obviously very different and is so much increased with each repeated inoculation that the danger of these repeated and cumulative infections from the artificial or inflicted septicemic disease called “cowpox” becomes much worse than the danger from the natural disease, smallpox, so that the patient is thus more likely to suffer and die from the “cure” rather than from the “disease,” as now frequently happens from vaccinations, as I have already abundantly proved by shocking examples in these pages.

THE FALSE GLORY OF JENNER AND THE DISGRACE OF THE MEDICAL PROFESSION

If, therefore, it were ever really true that one vaccination gave sure protection from smallpox for life and that the act of vaccination was in itself perfectly safe and harmless, as Jenner positively claimed, vaccination might then of course be a grand thing, of immense benefit to the human race, and might perhaps deserve all the good things that have been said about it by its interested flatterers and false advocates! But, of course, these big claims of life protection and perfect safety never were true but have been the gigantic falsehoods on which the great evil of compulsory vaccination has been justified by the medical profession and forced by it upon the people for many years past with great damage to human health and life--how much will never be known--and with great ethical disgrace to the medical profession itself, as I have already proved, and from which disgrace the profession should, surely, free itself at an early day for the sake of professional honor and decency if not for the sake of human right and safety, health and life.

WHAT PROTECTS US FROM SMALLPOX IN MODERN TIMES? IS IT VACCINATION OR SOMETHING ELSE? A FALSE CLAIM EXPLODED

We have just seen in the preceding chapter that high medical authorities positively assure us that vaccination gives no protection against smallpox unless it is done freshly once a year and is also then done _repeatedly_, “_until it no longer takes_,” which will surely require at least two successive vaccinations and may require from two to three, four or more successive vaccinations each year! Now let us seriously ask here: How many persons are there in the civil population or in the Army and Navy who have ever been, or are now, vaccinated in this way, viz., regularly once a year and then vaccinated repeatedly until the condition of _vaccinal saturation_ is reached where “_it no longer takes_”? I firmly believe that no well informed doctor, student or statistician will deny that _not five per cent._ of the civil population or of the Army and Navy has ever been vaccinated according to this rule and system which the experts assure us is the only safe and certain rule for vaccinal protection from smallpox! What, then, keeps the general population and the men of the Army and Navy so free from smallpox that for the generation past there are ordinarily less annual deaths from smallpox than from lightning? Surely it can not be vaccination that is responsible for this freedom from smallpox in modern times when not five per cent. of the population is vaccinated so that it can have any protection from smallpox!

The extreme pro-vaccinator has, however, long and loudly claimed, and has deceived himself and the trusting public with this false claim, that general vaccination is practically the sole and only thing that has brought about the modern reduction of smallpox or that can ever reduce smallpox! But this claim is obviously absurd and false on its face when we have already seen that not five per cent. of the population is vaccinated in such a way as can give any protection, and that ninety-five per cent. of the vaccinated population has no effective vaccinal protection whatever!

This false claim that vaccination has been the chief cause of the reduction in smallpox in modern times is further positively disproved by the flagrant fact that countries which are most extensively vaccinated have had the worst epidemics in modern times, such as the case of Japan cited on page 53; and that as a rule in all smallpox epidemics the great majority of cases always occur in well vaccinated subjects and the minority in unvaccinated subjects as officially acknowledged in the last epidemic in New York City in 1901 and 1902, cited on page 204.

Surely, therefore, vaccination cannot be solely responsible for the great modern reduction of smallpox, but, per contra, there have been some great benign, natural and artificial conditions which have intervened in human life since the old days of big smallpox epidemics and the adoption of vaccination, which benign conditions have brought about the great decline in smallpox--and not the unnatural and irrational condition of vaccination which has been falsely credited with this result. And it must be obvious that benign conditions which act by the _prevention_ and _reduction_ of disease are more likely to produce this result than a remedy like vaccination, which means the actual propagation and infliction of disease. Now what are these benign conditions? They are clearly of two kinds, “Natural” and “Artificial.” They are, first, natural, that is, some pervasive natural changes in conditions of human life, which are more or less unknown or not yet fully understood in their exact nature, but which have surely brought about a great reduction in the general death-rate and also in specific death-rates from several deadly diseases, in which no remedy such as vaccination has ever been used, and yet the general death-rate and the death-rates of these particular diseases have been reduced in modern times even more than smallpox has been reduced since the use of vaccination. For a few examples of these greatly reduced diseases we might mention Bubonic Plague, Epidemic Erysipelas, Typhus Fevers, Cholera, Scurvy, etc., etc. All of these terrible diseases which were once as bad or worse than smallpox have been not only reduced more than smallpox in modern times, but most of them have practically been totally obliterated in modern life, so that they have now become almost medical curiosities, and yet no such thing as vaccination has been used in this reduction. The other conditions which have brought about this reduction of these deadly diseases are the artificial and purely benign conditions of Sanitation, Hygiene and Isolation. Now if these safe and benign natural and artificial conditions have, undeniably, brought about the reduction or obliteration of these terrible diseases without any vaccination, is it not most logical and reasonable to conclude that these same safe and benign conditions have been the chief cause in reducing smallpox also, and that the burden of proof is clearly on the pro-vaccinators to prove, if they can, the preposterous claim that vaccination is the chief cause of this great reduction of smallpox?

At this point this striking historic and medical fact should be distinctly remembered that before the adoption of vaccination, and for some time afterwards, there were practically no such remedies known or used as Sanitation, Hygiene or Isolation. These rational defenses against smallpox and other diseases are in fact of very recent usage and have practically been used, in any extended or efficient manner, only within the last generation! And the reduction in smallpox practically dates from this usage and is proportional to the extent and regularity of this usage. See the great success of sanitation and isolation, etc., in reducing smallpox, without vaccination, in the English City of Leicester and the general effect of sanitation in recent times as set forth in the book, “The Vaccination Question,” by Dr. Millard, London, 1914.

It may therefore be very hard for us to realize this fact in modern times, that in the old unsanitary days of big epidemics and deadly plagues, the general population had no clear idea at all of the actual contagiousness of epidemic diseases or that they were spread by actual _contact_ or close proximity, from one person to the other, and therefore no effort whatever was made to isolate cases of dangerous disease like smallpox, which were thus commonly left freely exposed in public and private until they spread like wildfire through the whole community in frequent and wide-spread epidemics common in those days. Per contra, the idea generally held by the people in these old, unsanitary times was that epidemic diseases were spread universally, by some general malign influence, through the air--not by contact from person to person--and that they were _divine scourges_ sent by the wrath of God to punish man for his sins, and that it was not only useless but even impious to try to escape these scourges. Hence the old barbarous schemes of smallpox inoculation and cowpox vaccination agreed perfectly with this barbarous medical theology, for by these remedies the sinner or penitent patient did not try to escape the wrath of God but willingly bowed to it and took the scourge upon himself in a mild form with the hope in Divine Mercy to escape it in its worst form! This seems to have been the medical psychology of vaccination in past times!

THE UNSANITARY CONDITIONS OF JENNER’S DAY EXPOSED. POWER OF SANITATION TO EXTINGUISH SMALLPOX ADMITTED BY JENNER’S CHIEF ASSISTANT IN 1815

It can therefore be readily seen that, as soon as the barbarous system of deliberately inviting and spreading disease described in the preceding paragraph was abandoned, and the reckless exposure of smallpox in public and private was prevented by strict isolation and proper sanitation, smallpox epidemics were bound to decline and disappear. But this result has happened only in very recent times in advanced communities which have adopted some effective system of sanitation and isolation, and with little effect one way or the other from vaccination except that smallpox and other diseases and the general death-rate seem to be much worse where vaccination is extensively used and sanitation, isolation and hygiene are neglected, as has been proved flagrantly in the case of much-vaccinated Japan, cited on page 53, and, reversely, in the case of the English City of Leicester, cited on page 22, where the best effects in reduction of smallpox and increase in general health have been produced by abandoning vaccination and relying on sanitation, isolation and hygiene for the last thirty-five years.

Now, a very interesting and convincing evidence in this direction is furnished by Dr. Jenner’s chief assistant, Dr. James Moore, before quoted, who, writing over one hundred years ago, clearly recognized and admitted the truth and force of the above contention, viz., that sanitation and isolation would extinguish epidemic smallpox, without regard to vaccination; and this point I will now prove from Dr. Moore’s book on “The History of Smallpox,” published in London in 1815, which seems to have been one of the first authorities to urge sanitation and isolation for the suppression of this disease.

On pages 304 to 307 in Dr. Moore’s book, he gives a very clear statement of the above point, as follows: