Vaccines have been around in many different forms for a long time. Various reports disagree on exactly when inoculation became a thing, however some sources put it back almost two thousand years ago. Evidence shows that inoculation was practiced in the 1500s with smallpox. Although it was in practice for a long time, inoculation as a practice spread to Europe and North America quite slowly and was poorly regarded. However, epidemics clearly showed that people who had been inoculated were significantly less likely to die from small pox. In 1796, Edward Jenner tested a theory that cow pox would work against small pox and developed vaccinations. Vaccines were much safer than inoculations and dramatically reduced the number of small pox deaths. Over time vaccines were developed for other diseases and other methods were developed to weaken diseases for vaccinations. In 1882, the Anti-Vaccination League of America had its first meeting. Since then, we have only developed more vaccines and learned more about diseases and safe vaccinations.
Did any of this information surprise you?
What do you know about the history of vaccines?
Given their long history, why do you think some people are anti-vaccines?
