The distrust of vaccines and the total rejection of a part of the population to be vaccinated are phenomena that appeared when this technique was invented, at the end of the 18th century.
“Vaccination refusal is as old as vaccination itself,” according to health historian Patrick Zylberman.
Now that feeling returns today, with the covid-19 as the authorities press for the maximum population to be inoculated. Here we leave you a journey through more than two centuries of advances and suspicions.
“Diabolical”
Smallpox was a terrible disease for many centuries, until its eradication in 1980 thanks to vaccines.
Before the invention of vaccination, an immunization process existed since the beginning of the 18th century; It was about inoculating the virus through the scarifications on the arms, since an infection through the blood was less dangerous than through the respiratory route.
The method aroused controversy throughout the eighteenth century in Europe, both scientifically and religiously. An English clergyman, Edmund Massey, compared in 1772 the method to an operation “diabolical“which according to Edmund, was not founded, neither on the laws of nature nor on those of religion.
Fear of “animal product”
In 1796, the English physician Edward Jenner he had the idea of inoculating a child with a form of the mild smallpox virus to stimulate its immune reaction.
The process worked, the “vaccination“. But mistrust and fear quickly arose. A cartoon from 1802 shows a vaccination session where the inoculated people are transformed into monsters, half man half cow.
“Vaccination is about introducing an animal product into a human body. It is an abomination, the animalization of the human being,” explains Patrick Zylberman about the ideas that permeated back then.
Obligations and exemptions
In the UK, smallpox vaccination was made compulsory for children from 1853, in a series of laws that provided for fines for recalcitrant parents.
This obligation generated the virulent opposition of its detractors, who criticized the “violation of individual freedoms“explain the researchers. Annick Guimezanes Y Marion Matthew.
From 1898 a conscience clause was introduced into British law to allow parents who did not want their children to be vaccinated to avoid penalties.
“Lab Rage”
In 1885, Louis Pasteur developed a vaccine against rabies from an attenuated strain of the virus. In 1885 a successful injection was made to Joseph Meister, a boy who had been bitten by a dog suspected of having rabies.
In this case there was also mistrust. Pasteur he was accused of wanting to enrich himself by manufacturing a laboratory rage.
BCG, diphtheria, tetanus…
The 1920s saw the proliferation of vaccines against tuberculosis (BCG, 1921), diphtheria (1923), tetanus (1926) and tosferina (1926).
Also in this decade, aluminum salts began to be used as an adjuvant to increase the efficacy of vaccines. This was also a source of suspicion for opponents of vaccines, particularly in France.
Autism?
In 1998, a study published in the prestigious medical journal The Lancet suggested a relationship between MMR vaccines (measles, mumps, rubella) and autism.
It was discovered that it was a rigging of the author Andrew Wakefield. But neither the official denial of the magazine, nor the subsequent works, demonstrating the absence of a link that managed to quell fears.
This study is still routinely cited by opponents of vaccines.
Expelled in 2010 from the British Doctors Association, however, Andrew Wakefield reappears in the United States with an anti-vaccine speech with plotting touches, as reflected in his conspiracy documentary “Vaxxed” in 2016.
H1N1 vaccine and narcolepsy
In 2009, the flu pandemic H1N1 sounded the alerts at the World Health Organization (WHO). Vaccination campaigns were prepared but the epidemic was less serious than expected.
Millions of doses had to be destroyed and the criticisms of mismanagement reinforced mistrust.
Sometimes Pandemrix can increase the risk of narcolepsy, a sleep disorder. In Sweden, of the 5.5 million people vaccinated, 440 people were officially recognized as suffering from this ailment and were compensated.
Taliban turnaround in the face of polio
Officially eradicated since August 2020 in Africa thanks to the vaccine, polio resists in Asia, in Pakistan and Afghanistan, where this disease, which causes paralysis in children, is still endemic.
in afghanistanThe Taliban previously denounced vaccination campaigns as a Western plot to sterilize Muslim children. Since they returned to power in August 2021, they have collaborated on campaigns with the WHO and Unicef.
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