Scar Of Smallpox Essay

Ann Becker the author of the article “Smallpox in Washington's Army: Strategic Implications of the Disease During the American Revolutionary War,” discusses in her article of the disease Small Pox affected the how the militaries powers while they fought during the American Revolutionary War. Becker explains how during the war nearly took out a large population of the American military because so many soldiers were impacted by the disease. This then affected how the fought during war. Becker states that the virus was extremely deadly and contagious; she stated “It was the most deforming and lethal of the plague-like epidemics of the seventeenth and eighteenth centuries.” The soldiers who suffered through this disease, rarely got over it, and

The diseases were to aggressive and adequate medicine had not been developed to eradicate them during the war. Field medics had no medical training and were still in charge of the sick and wounded. The medical personnel did their best to vaccinate for smallpox, as it was a major disease in the war. Small pox was one of the deadliest diseases of the Revolutionary War era. In addition, the British weaponized smallpox to kill an entire rank at one time.

However, Jenner’s invention became a common practice only a few years after he released it to the public, and according to The Hutchinson Unabridged Encyclopedia, “By 1890 smallpox had virtually been eradicated from Britain.” (“Jenner, Edward (1749-1823)”) From the information about the first vaccination, we can see that vaccinations have been proven to eliminate deadly diseases, whether they receive opposition or not. Without immunizations, we would be overcome with diseases, such as smallpox, polio, and measles.

The smallpox epidemic that was introduced into the Americas by the European travelers was devastating, especially to the natives. Killing off 80-90% of native populations in just the first 150 years following 1492. [INSERT DIRECT SOURCE. FIND THE WEBSITE LINK, GO TO BIBME.COM AND SOURCE THIS INFO.] One of the reasons this disease was so devastating was due to the regrettable fact that the

Smallpox was a very devastating disease during the mid-1700’s and killed over 400,000 people annually across Europe. Smallpox spread rapidly and was a very contagious disease. Smallpox was caused by the variola virus and after being infected with the disease people would experience symptoms that included headaches, chills, backaches, fever, rashes along with a breakout of pimples. People who were infected with the variola virus would recuperate, however, three out of ten people would die. Fortunately, in July 1796, a rural physician named Edward Jenner found the variolation procedure to prevent people from developing the severe virus of smallpox.

In the book, “Survival of the Sickest”, Sharon Moalem forms the basis of how vaccine originated to become a way of combatting the most dangerous diseases in the world. It began with a discovery from a man named Edward Jenner, a doctor from Gloucestershire county in England, where he began to understand a strange pattern when people who were immune to cowpox were struggling with smallpox and vice-versa. He started to test his findings through a small experiment where he injected cow pox into a group of young children and he was surprised to see that their bodies built immunity towards smallpox and supported his findings on the bizarre immunity of people towards either the smallpox or the cowpox but not to both. The rest of the chapter explains complex concepts

Inoculation of smallpox was an experiment of the eighteenth century which was the practice of infecting people with mild cases of smallpox so they could strengthen their immune system against the deadly cases of smallpox. The results of the experiment confirmed that it worked because there was an epidemic in the 1720s and people with the treatment did not get infected. This is relevant because it emphasizes the ways people back then would experiment with things having no idea if they worked or not. Pgs

In addition, the opposition cites evidence from “Edward Jenner (English Surgeon), a text/lecture by Lester S. King. The author maintains that “Jenner concluded that cowpox not only protected against smallpox but could be transmitted from one person to another as a deliberate mechanism of protection.” “On May 1, 1796 he inoculated an eight-year-old boy, James Phipps, who had never had smallpox. Phipps became slightly ill over the course of the next 9 days but was well on the 10th. On July 1 Jenner inoculated the boy again, this time with smallpox matter.

In defense of inoculation as a feasible course of action, the argument that stands out above the rest, in my opinion, is that there were instances where this treatment was employed in parts of Asia and Africa, and the results were favorable. Admittedly, there were some individuals, when exposed to the smallpox contagion, who did not survive, it is hard to say if it was due to being introduced to a weakened strain of smallpox, or other outside causes. Nonetheless, one cannot argue with the success rate those in other lands experienced when using inoculation against

Throughout history, smallpox has been one of the dreaded scourges that inflicted mankind. World Health Organization (WHO) stated that smallpox is responsible for the 300 million death cases worldwide in the twentieth century. (Fenner, Henderson, Arita, Jezek , & Ladnyi, 1988) (Plotkin, 2004) It was only after Dr Edward Jenner’s development on the principle of vaccination that provided the only accurate technique for the prevention of smallpox. The introduction of vaccinia vaccine enabled the global eradication of naturally occurring smallpox in 1970, it is recorded that the last known smallpox case recorded was in Somalia after the eradication. (Rappuoli, Miller, & Falkow, 2002) Jenner’s procedure has been a highly effective immunizing agent, however, it seemed that it isn’t a successful fighter to disease because it carries high incidence of adverse side effects and severe complications. (Madigan, Martinko, Stahl , & Clark, 2012)This

For approximately three-thousand years, smallpox has ravaged and plagued the four corners of the globe. In fact, in the 17 th and 18 th centuries, it was claimed to be the most infectious disease in the West, with an astounding 90% mortality rate in America. It wasn't until 1796, with English surgeon Edward Jenner's smallpox vaccination, that the world saw relief from this devastating virus. However, even with this inoculation in use, the world continued to witness death from both the virus and the vaccine. In the year 1966, it was estimated that 10-15 million infected citizens world wide had passed away from smallpox that year alone ( “History” 12). As a result of these devastating numbers, in the following year, 1967, the World Health

He inoculated by taking a very small quantity of fluid from an unripe smallpox pustule, on the point of a lancet, and inserting it between the outer and inner layers of the skin of the upper arm without drawing blood. He did not use a bandage to cover the incision. Jenner had always been fascinated by the rural old wives' tale that milkmaids could not get smallpox. He believed that there was a connection between the fact that milkmaids only got a weak version of smallpox (the non-life threatening cowpox) but did not get the strong version, smallpox itself. A milkmaid who caught cowpox got blisters on her hands and Jenner concluded that it must be the pus in the blisters that somehow protected the milkmaids.

Preliminary, it is necessary to admit that there is no effective medication for pox disease. Those people who suffer from the disease may get only special treatment procedures; however, it will not give them a chance to be cured completely.

Human beings have benefited from vaccines for more than two centuries, but the journey leading up to the discovery of vaccines was neither easy nor short. The story starts with Edward Jenner, a country doctor living in Berkeley, England (Stern and Howard, Paragraph. 6). Mentioned before, Jenner was a country doctor, which means that he helped treat and care for animals found amongst the countryside, like chickens, horses, and even cows. Because Jenner knew how to treat animals that were so much like humans in terms of anatomy and illness, he was able to apply some of his knowledge to create something that would be used for years to come. First, Jenner took pus from a cowpox lesion on a milkmaid’s hand and injected it into eight-year-old James

“I do believe sadly that its going to take some diseases to realize that we need to change and develop vaccines that are safe”(Jenny McCarthy). In the eighteenth century, there was a widespread of the smallpox disease which killed its victims and left them terribly disabled. Vaccines are scientific preperations that provide active acquired ability of an organism to resist a paricular infection. Vaccines contain agents that act as life threatening objects in the body. These agents allow the body to recognize them as so and help the body destroy it. Edward Jenner, a physician and scientist, founded vaccinology in 1796 after planting cowpox into an eight year old boy, who resisted smallpox. He inserted the vaccine into a wound in the boy’s arm.