94 Notice from the Vaccine Pock Institution*. 



NOTICE FROM THE VACCINE POCK INSTITUTION^ 



No. 44 , Broad-Street, Golden- Square. 



tc, June, 1M04.. 



The public mind being of late much disturbed in conse- 

 quence of successive reports during the whole of the last 

 year, and especially of late by publications of cases esteemed 

 to be instances of the small-pox two or three years subse- 

 quently to the cow-pock,. the medical establishment of this 

 institution have thought it their duty, whatever may be 

 their own opinions, not to be inactive and silent. 



Accordingly, I am directed to state that, in the last fort- 

 night, a number of subjects who had undergone vaccina- 

 tion in the year 1800 (the first year of the new practice 

 at any professed institution) have been submitted to the 

 test or counter-proof, variolation, in circumstances the most 

 favourable for exciting the small-pox. Besides these trials, 

 additional ones have been instituted on subjects who were 

 vaccinated in Dr. Pearson's early practice in 1 799- Further, 

 Reports have been already received at the Institution from 

 several provincial correspondents who were witnesses to 

 whole parishes of subjects vaccinated under Dr. Pearson's 

 and Mr. Keate's inspection, or with matter furnished by 

 them, early in the year 1799 *• 



A very brief, but it is presumed conclusive statement of 

 evidence, collected from these sources, on the question 

 with which some persons have agitated the minds of so 

 many families, is intended to be laid before the public in a 

 week or ten days. This statement, it is apprehended, will 

 be the most proper return to the respectable author, who 

 has lately addressed his pamphlet u To the Directors of the 

 Vaccine Institution,*' very justly conceiving " that the 

 point at issue is within the power of this Institution, if they 

 will give directions for a number of persons to be inoculated 

 with small-pox matter, and exposed strongly to infection, 

 who were vaccinated early in the practice/' — As no other 

 professed vaccine institution but this has been established 

 long enough to answer the demand, it has been determined 

 to comply. W. Sancho, Secretary. 



* It may be very important information to affirm, that the matter now 

 used at this Institution was that originally taken in January and Febru- 

 ary i?99» by one of the physicians, from cows in Marylebone-ficlds and 

 Gray's-inn-lane ; with the addition, about three years ago, of matter 

 from the Milanese, by Dr. Sacco. But it does not appear that this exten- 

 sive succession has at all altered the properties, nor that there is any dif- 

 ference of properties among these different sources of matter. The expe- 

 rience of this Institution does not justify the conclusions, that the failure 

 of the cow-pock in preventing the small-pox depends in general upon the 

 selection of matter on a particular day. 



4 1SEW 



