Erysipelas & vaccination
 Erysipelas  Smallpox quotes

"So long ago as 1806, the College of Surgeons published 24 cases of inflammation of the arm following vaccination, whereof three proved fatal. In 1844 the Dublin Journal of Medical Science published a series of cases of erysipelas after vaccination.   In 1849-50, Dr. J. Jones, of Boston, reported that erysipelas frequently followed vaccination. In 1871 a great number of cases occurred in London. In 1876, a series of eighteen cases, of which eight proved fatal, were disclosed at Gainsborough, and were the subject of a Local Government Board inquiry by Dr. Netten Radcliffe.   In 1878, Dr. Martin, of Boston, wrote of erysipelas, "that miserable complication, the pest of vaccinators."   Enough has been said to show that erysipelas does not unfrequently follow vaccination, in different places and countries, and under divers conditions; that there is some connection between the two factors apart from surroundings and accident, and that the greatest and most remarkable peculiarity of all, in the Norwich cases, is, that they should have obtained such wide recognition and publicity."------William J. Collins, M.D., B.S., B.Sc. (Lond) (1883 A Review of the Norwich Vaccination Inquiry)

"I may quote from the "Public Health Reports," New Series, No. 3, wherein it is stated that "Septic material containing micrococci, when applied to a wound, produces intense local inflammation, which rapidly affects the surrounding skin; the spreading disease thus produced corresponds in all its phenomena with erysipelas."   If for "septic material containing micrococci" we substitute the legitimately inter­changeable term "vaccine lymph," it would be difficult even for Dr. Buchanan to escape from the conclusion that the erysipelatous poison is inherent in the vaccine lymph. And here, strange enough we have the illustrious corroboration of Dr. Jenner's own testimony, for if there was anything Jenner insisted upon it was this—that erysipelas is a necessary accompaniment of true cow-pox—in fact, the seal of authenticity. Indeed, when hard pressed for pure lymph, he confesses he resorted with the utmost indifference to an "extensive inflammation of an erysipelatous character in the upper part of the thigh of a sucking-colt" for a supply; and he added, that the lymph thus obtained was the true, and not the spurious, cowpox, was beyond contention."------William J. Collins, M.D., B.S., B.Sc. (Lond) (1883 A Review of the Norwich Vaccination Inquiry)