Benjamin Jesty: new light in the dawn of vaccination

doi:10.1016/S0140-6736(03)15111-2

The Lancet

Volume 362, Issue 9401, 20–27 December 2003, Pages 2104-2109

https://doi.org/10.1016/S0140-6736(03)15111-2 Get rights and content

Summary

“History is not what you thought. It is what you can remember”.¹

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Citation Excerpt :
Inoculation and variolation to induce immunity against smallpox was used widely in China, Turkey, India, Ethiopia, and West African countries.1 Although one typically thinks of the history of vaccination beginning with Dr Edward Jenner, Dr Benjamin Jesty was the first to document use of cowpox to prevent smallpox disease; however, Dr Edward Jenner is credited with using scientific rigor to understand the process and lay the foundation for future immunology advances.2–5 Today vaccines can provide immunity against and treatment of a growing number of diseases including noninfectious conditions.
The origins of the vaccine
2020, Revista Medica Clinica Las Condes
La medicina china y su cultura ancestral parecen tener los antecedentes más remotos de los intentos por prevenir o curar el azote epidemiológico de esa época: la viruela. Estos conocimientos empíricos llegaron al Asia Central y Europa, y algunos granjeros hicieron observaciones de la utilidad de la inoculación o variolización sin llegar a documentar sus ensayos en la comunidad científica. El mérito de Edward Jenner reconocido como el descubridor de la vacuna antivariólica, radica en haber demostrado con evidencia práctica la protección conferida frente a la enfermedad por la administración en un niño sano de un material proveniente de una persona con lesiones causadas por el cowpox, virus de la viruela vacuna. Desde Europa en el siglo XVIII y comienzos del siglo XIX, la inoculación primero y luego la vacunación llegan a Hispanoamérica por vías informales o por determinación de la corona como un servicio a las colonias. La vacunación antivariólica tuvo el valor agregado de motivar y convencer a las autoridades gubernamentales sobre la necesidad de implementar políticas de salud pública para responder a las necesidades sanitarias de la población. En Chile, Fray Pedro Manuel Chaparro fue el pionero en la aplicación y difusión de la vacuna, realizó la primera campaña nacional y se cuenta entre los padres de la salud pública nacional.
Chinese medicine and its ancestral culture seem to have the most remote history of attempts to prevent or cure the epidemiological scourge of that era: smallpox. This empirical knowledge reached Central Asia and Europe, and some farmers made observations of the usefulness of inoculation or variolization without documenting their trials to the scientific community. The merit of Edward Jenner, recognized as the discoverer of the smallpox vaccine, lies in having demonstrated with practical evidence the protection conferred against the disease by the administration in a healthy child of a material from a person with cowpox lesions. From Europe in the eighteenth and early nineteenth centuries, first inoculation and then vaccination arrive in Latin America by informal means or by determination of the crown as a service to the colonies. Smallpox vaccination had the added value of motivating and convincing government authorities about the need to implement public health policies to respond to the health needs of the population. In Chile, Fray Pedro Manuel Chaparro was the pioneer in the application and diffusion of the vaccine, conducted the first national campaign and is counted among the parents of national public health.
Controlled human infections: A report from the controlled human infection models workshop, Leiden University Medical Centre 4–6 May 2016
2017, Vaccine
The principle of deliberately infecting humans with infectious agents in a controlled setting, so-called controlled human infections (CHI), is not novel. Many CHI models have a long history and were established decades ago such as the intentional exposure to yellow fever and dengue performed in the 1900’s (Reed, 1902) [2]. In these times bioethics and scientific reasoning were in their infancy. Nowadays, clinical trials are highly regulated and CHI are executed worldwide. Controlled human malaria infections and influenza infections are the two most frequently practiced. Others are experiencing a revival or are being carefully developed. Because CHI models test the efficacy of promising vaccine or drug candidates early in clinical development, they offer the potential to decrease the number of failing phase 2 and 3 trials, reducing risks for patients and saving costs and efforts.
In addition, CHI models provide unprecedented opportunities to dissect the physiological, immunological and metabolic changes that occur upon infection. However, it is clear that controlled infections require careful deliberation of safety, ethics, quarantine, scientific output and the production of infectious material.
An independent international workshop was hosted by the Leiden University Medical Centre in The Netherlands, bringing together clinical investigators, basic scientists, regulators, funders and policy makers from 22 different countries to discuss the opportunities and challenges in CHI. The aim of the workshop was to discuss CHI as a tool to advance science, drug and vaccine development, share the challenges of establishing a CHI model with specific focus on neglected tropical diseases and the possibilities to transfer models to endemic sites. Noticeably, among the 128 participants were clinical investigators from ten different countries in Sub-Saharan Africa. An important dimension of the meeting was to give the floor to young established clinicians and scientists to voice their perspective on the future of CHI models.
Smallpox and Vaccinia
2017, Plotkin's Vaccines
A Short History of Vaccination
2017, Plotkin's Vaccines

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Department of Medical HistoryBenjamin Jesty: new light in the dawn of vaccination

Summary

1066 and all that

Myths in medicine

BMJ

The evidence at large, as laid before the committee of the House of Commons, respecting Dr Jenner's discovery of vaccine inoculation, together with the debate: and some observations on the contravening evidence

Observations on Dr Pearson's Examination of the Report of the Vaccine Pock Committee of the House of Commons, concerning Dr Jenner's claim for remuneration

Who discovered smallpox vaccination? Edward Jenner or Benjamin Jesty?

Trans Am Clin Climatol Assoc

The First Vaccinator

Benjamin Jesty, farmer vaccinator

BrJ Clin Pract

London Rev Books

Medicine's Strangest Cases

Department of Medical History
Benjamin Jesty: new light in the dawn of vaccination