An answer to Mr. Goldson; proving that vaccination is a permanent security against the small-pox / By John Ring.

  • John Ring
Date:
1804
Catalogue details

Licence: Public Domain Mark

Credit: An answer to Mr. Goldson; proving that vaccination is a permanent security against the small-pox / By John Ring. Source: Wellcome Collection.

    47/48 (page 43)
    cractice has been far more considerable than that of the Vaccine Pock Institution, both in extent and duration. It is therefore an insult to deny, that they have it as much in their power to institute further experiments on the subject 5 as it is a mockery to affirm, that no party is so fit to decide the point, as that which furnished the matter, and of courso is interested in the question. It is rather unfortunate for Mr. Goldson’s argument, that he did not put some of his early patients to the test of vario¬ lous inoculation, soon after they were vaccinated. Had he done this, he would have maintained the doctrine of a tem¬ porary preservative with a better grace. We should then have been able to ascertain much better, ho'w far his patients were capable of resisting the infection of the small-pox, at any period. As to vague and general assertions, concerning exposure to the natural infection, those who understand the subject, will pay but little attention to them. The memora¬ ble case of the nightcap is an exception ; but ridiculous if brought forward to substantiate the point in question, since there is no old woman who has not known a multitude of similar escapes, without the aid of vaccination. There is one circumstance which has given rise to a num¬ ber of errroneous conclusions, and brought considerable dis- ■f ^ .C credit upon vaccination. This is the similarity of the chicken-pox to the small-pox; which has occasioned it to be mistaken for that disease, in many instances, by the first physicians in Europe. It has often deceived practitioners, even after successive inoculations; and their unhappy patients have been left to discover the fatal error. How far this complaint has been mistaken for the small-pox at Ports¬ mouth, I cannot pretend to determine ; but in the metro¬ polis, it is easy to produce cases in abundance. Mr. Goldson plumes himself upon being the first, who has publicly brought forward cases, to shew the want of perma¬ nent security in vaccination. This is to be attributed, partly to his ill success, and partly to the provocation he has met with. Such is the fate of vaccination, that when a single spark of enmity to the practice lurks in the mind of a medical man; nothing is necessary but gratuitous inoculation in his neighbourhood, to blow it into a flame. INDEX,