How did 19th-century people, who lacked aircraft and cryopreservation technology, carry vaccines to every corner of the world?



Vaccines are a mechanism to obtain immunity by administering attenuated and detoxified antigens to prevent infectious diseases, and their history goes back to the vaccination (smallpox vaccine) discovered at the end of the 18th century. Professor Alex Tabarock of George Mason University explains the question, 'How did 19th-century people who lacked transportation networks and facilities carry vaccines to every corner of the world?'

The Distribution of Vaccines in the 19th Century --Marginal REVOLUTION
https://marginalrevolution.com/marginalrevolution/2020/09/the-distribution-of-vaccines-in-the-19th-century.html

The new coronavirus vaccine, developed by Pfizer and Moderna in 2020, was immediately shipped to authorities-approved countries. Since all vaccines require transportation and storage at extremely low temperatures of -20 degrees (moderna) to -70 degrees (Pfizer), airline companies are using large electric refrigeration equipment and multi-layered refrigerating containers using liquid nitrogen. We have introduced new transportation facilities such as.

Angle: New Corona Vaccine, Preparations for Ultra-Low Temperature Transport Aviation Companies | Reuters
https://jp.reuters.com/article/health-coronavirus-airlines-freight-idJPKBN28007O



In modern times, the development of high-speed transportation networks using aircraft and low-temperature storage technology has made it easier to transport vaccines that are easily inactivated to various parts of the world. However, the transportation of vaccines was a major issue because such transportation networks and technologies did not exist in the late 18th and 19th centuries when the first vaccination was developed.

◆ Development of vaccination
Vaccine transport was even more difficult at the end of the 18th century, when British doctor

Edward Jenner developed a vaccination method to prevent smallpox infection. Smallpox has a very high case fatality rate of 20% to 50% and has severe sequelae. It is a serious infectious disease that has frequently spread around the world, including Japan, and has caused many deaths.

Jenner noticed that it was a rural tradition that 'people who come into contact with cows by milking and get cowpox do not get smallpox.' Jenner continued his research on cowpox and smallpox, and established a vaccination method to prevent smallpox infection by inoculating healthy people with pus from cowpox patients. In 1796, he tried the vaccination method on his child and confirmed its effectiveness, and in 1798 announced a series of results. In a later study, it was found that cowpox virus did not prevent smallpox infection, but another virus called vaccinia virus, which was mixed in cowpox pus, functioned as a vaccine for smallpox. ..

Vaccination was very effective in preventing smallpox infection, but because vaccination was easily inactivated by heat and sunlight, the best container for vaccination with the technology at that time was the 'human body.' Therefore, until the immune system defeats the virus in the body of the person who inoculated the vaccination, the pus is taken out from the pustules that appeared in the person's body and inoculated to another person by 'relay of vaccination using the human body'. It is said that vaccination was widespread.

Because to preserve vaccination, it was necessary to constantly inoculate someone's body with vaccination and keep the vaccination ready for another person, so `` The person who received the vaccination provided the vaccination to someone else. There was also a move to oblige 'to do'. For example, in Glasgow, England, a system was created to extract vaccination from children by refunding the fee collected at the time of vaccination to parents who brought the vaccinated children back to the clinic.



After that, in the process of spreading vaccination all over the world, various applications and new preservation techniques were developed.

◆ Transportation by Spain to the Americas
In 1803, King

Charles IV of Spain ordered doctor Francisco Javier de Balmis to 'deliver vaccination to the Spanish colonies on the Americas.' In order to safely deliver the easily inactivated vaccination, Balmis applied the preservation of vaccination using the human body.

First, Barmis collected '22 orphans who had never had smallpox or cowpox' and inoculated two of them with vaccination just before departure. After that, Barmis, who boarded a ship that crosses the Atlantic Ocean, repeated the work of transferring vaccination from an orphan who developed cowpox to another orphan, and succeeded in delivering the vaccination alive.

◆ Transport container invented by Thomas Jefferson
Vaccination was introduced to the United States in 1800, when Benjamin Waterhouse , a professor at Harvard Medical School , successfully imported it with the help of then Vice President Thomas Jefferson .

Jefferson also wanted to be vaccinated with vaccination, but he said he had failed several times to deliver the vaccination alive from Harvard Medical School. Therefore, Jefferson devised a container that 'stores the lymphatic fluid of vaccination in the inner container and fills the outer container surrounding this container with cold water', and ordered the vaccination from Harvard Medical School.



◆ Transportation and spread from Europe to India
Jean de Caro is an avid supporter of vaccination in Europe and has played an important role in introducing vaccination to eastern Europe such as Austria, Poland, Greece, Venice and Constantinople. In a letter sent to Jenner, Caro used the technique of 'sealing cotton scraps soaked with cowpox lymph with two glass plates, wrapping them in black paper to prevent sunlight, and then tightly sealing them with wax.' He explained that he had delivered the vaccination to Baghdad .

The vaccination that arrived in Baghdad was inoculated into an Armenian child and reached India by a relay using the human body. It is said that the daughter of a servant named Anna Dusthall was the first to be vaccinated in India, and the following week, five children were vaccinated from the dusthole.

The problem with spreading vaccination in India was that the vaccination was unfamiliar from abroad, and the traditional 'smallpox patient's vaccination was attenuated and transplanted into a healthy person to cause mild smallpox. The point was that it caused a backlash from religious medical professionals who used the smallpox method of 'causing the onset of smallpox.' In addition, vaccination was disseminated through people of various castes , which was unacceptable to Hindus with a strict caste system. Therefore, the British advertised the royal family of the Odeya dynasty who inoculated the vaccination and spread the vaccination among the Indians.



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