A history of the variolous epidemic which occurred in Norwich in the year 1819 and destroyed 530 individuals; with an estimate of the protection afforded by vaccination, and a review of past and present opinions upon chicken-pox and modified smallpox / by John Cross.

  • Cross, John, 1790-1850.
Date:
1820
Catalogue details

Licence: Public Domain Mark

Credit: A history of the variolous epidemic which occurred in Norwich in the year 1819 and destroyed 530 individuals; with an estimate of the protection afforded by vaccination, and a review of past and present opinions upon chicken-pox and modified smallpox / by John Cross. Source: Wellcome Collection.

Provider: This material has been provided by Royal College of Physicians, London. The original may be consulted at Royal College of Physicians, London.

    54/320 (page 34)
    to the invasion of the epidemic. The protec- tion afforded to these, in the midst of the most destructive small-pox will, I hope, be fully shewn in the progress of this part of my work ; but I wish here to introduce a general result of what happened to the vaccinated in the families where the two hundred cases of small-pox oc- curred of which I kept a particular register. In forty-two of the hundred and twelve families, those who had formerly had the cow-pox lived in the same house where the small-pox existed, and as the lowest classes of the poor were the sufferers, the ninety-one* vaccinated persons were continually in the same room, and often lay in the same bed, with the variolous patients. Thirty-four were vaccinated during the epide- mic, after the small-pox had appeared in their families, and were thereby prevented from hav- ing the latter disease. The remaining fifty-seven had the cow-pox at different periods, from three to twenty years, viz. From three to five years 3 five to ten years - - 37 ten to fifteen years - 11 fifteen to twenty years - - - 6 None of them had been vaccinated less than three years, shewing the neglect of the *See Chap. 1st, page 7.