I'd like to acknowledge a few books that opened my eyes to this controversial but fascinating field of research.
The first is The Virus and the Vaccine, a fascinating true story of the contamination of the polio vaccine with a cancer-causing monkey virus.
The second is Dr. Mary's Monkey. Although I didn't use this book as a source, it's a thrilling story in its own right, and weaves together the JFK assassination, the contaminated polio vaccine scandal, and a secret project to develop a bio-weapon to kill Fidel Castro.
Lastly I owe much of this research to the indispensable Vaccine Safety Manual for Concerned Families and Health Practitioners. The thousands of references provided have proved to be a veritable gold mine.
Smallpox Shenanigans
Smallpox is caused by the variola virus. You can catch smallpox through infected blankets or clothing, or by inhaling droplets discharged from the nose and mouth of an infected person.
Within 12 days after exposure, those infected will experience fever, nausea, vomiting, headache, backache, and muscle pains. This is soon followed by severe abdominal pain and a subsequent rash develops on the entire body. The rash then transforms into pus-filled sores which eventually crust over and may leave scars. The disease almost always confers permanent immunity.
There are different forms of smallpox (variola major, variola minor, fulminating, malignant, modified, etc.) and some are more serious than others. According to the WHO, case-fatality rate can reach 20% or higher. By 1980 the WHO declared that smallpox had been eradicated.
Although the WHO was quick to give credit to their own worldwide vaccination campaign begun in 1967, variola had already stopped infecting people in more than 8 out of 10 countries throughout the world. At that time, only 131,000 cases of smallpox were reported. According to Neil Miller:
The history of smallpox inoculations is important to get an understanding of the history of vaccination, and not just because this story explains how the word “vaccine” was derived.
By the 1700s, it was known that contracting smallpox would give you immunity later in life. Some doctors even intentionally exposed people to smallpox hoping to provoke a less severe reaction and still confer immunity. Children were even exposed to pus extracted from “mild” cases of smallpox, a technique known as variolation.
In 1715, Peter Kennedy suggested collecting smallpox fluid and introducing it to the patient through a scratch in the skin. This technique would become the model for future applications and research.
In 1774, Benjamin Jesty set out to prove that cowpox infection protected against smallpox. Apparently, there was a rumor in England among 18th century dairymaids that when you catch cowpox, a relatively harmless disease, you would become immune to smallpox.
Jesty took diseased matter from cows and “vaccinated” his wife and sons (cowpox is also referred to as the vaccinia virus). Supposedly, no one in his family contracted smallpox during later epidemics, although his wife almost lost her arm as the result of a severe inflammation, rousing the ire of his peers for experimenting on his own family.
Enter Edward Jenner, an English physician whose work Wikipedia dubiously refers to as having “saved more lives than the work any other human.” Apparently, no credit is due to the 18th century milkmaids, or even Jesty, who “unlike Edward Jenner, a medical doctor who is given broad credit for developing the smallpox vaccine in 1796, did not publicize his findings made some twenty years earlier in 1774.”
Despite facing a good deal of opposition, Edward Jenner continued his experiments and in 1798 he published his Inquiry into the Causes and Effects of the Variolae Vaccinae, a “vulgar treatise” on horsegrease cowpox.
Jenner continued to promote his nauseating treatment and as a result of his petitions to the House of Commons in 1802 and 1807, mass inoculation campaigns began.
Wikipedia's bold statement seems to be losing some of its bite, for Jenner even admitted that his “gift” caused disease and death: “The happy effects of inoculation...not very unfrequently produces deformity of the skin, and sometimes, under the best management, proves fatal.” He tried to blame the failures on improper inoculations, an excuse that would continue to be used in the years following his death in 1823.
By that time, three kinds of smallpox vaccination were being used, cowpox (promoted as “pure lymph from the calf”), horsepox (known as “the true and genuine life-preserving fluid”) and horsegrease cowpox, the “foul concoction” promoted in Jenner's Inquiry. All were known to cause disease and death.
After Jenner's deaths, vaccine failures continued to be blamed on improperly administered inoculations. Soon, two or more punctures were recommended, with some doctors claiming that a “good vaccination” required four punctures.
Even though there is no evidence that the number of puncture marks influenced the success of the practice, medical authorities at the time suggested that people be vaccinated again and again “until vesicles cease to respond to the insertion of the virus.” [White, W., pg. xxiii.]
Even the renowned playwright George Bernard Shaw was aware of the medical shenanigans used to hoodwink the public: “During the last epidemic at the turn of the century, I was a member of the Health Committee of London Borough Council. I learned how the credit of vaccination is kept up statistically by diagnosing all the re-vaccinated cases as pustular eczema, varioloid or whatnot—except smallpox.” [Ibid., pg. 64]
By around 1850, several countries had enacted compulsory vaccination laws, including Bavaria, Denmark and England.
Dr. William Farr, Compiler of Statistics of the Registrar-General, London, noted that “Smallpox attained its maximum mortality after vaccination was introduced. The mean annual mortality to 10,000 population from 1850 to 1869 was at the rate of 2.04, whereas in 1871 the death rate was 10.24 and in 1872 the death rate was 8.33, and this after the most laudable efforts to extend vaccination by legislative enactments.” [McBean, E., pg. 27]
According to Sir Thomas chambers, a London health official: “Of the 155 persons admitted to the Smallpox hospital in the Parish of St. James, Piccadilly, 145 had been vaccinated.” At Marylevore hospital, 92% of the smallpox cases had been vaccinated. In 1871, officials at Highgate Hospital admitted that 92% had been vaccinated as well.
The German Chancellor himself opined, “The hopes placed in the efficacy of the cowpox virus as a preventative of smallpox have proved entirely deceptive.”
Over a twenty year period beginning in 1886, thousands of Japanese citizens died and hundreds of thousands were infected with smallpox after Japan enforced mandatory shots every five years. [Shelton, HM. Vaccine and Serum Evils (San Antonio Texas; Health research, 1966):20-21]
In 1918 and 1919, after the US took control of the Philippines, mandatory smallpox vaccination was enforced. Thousands died after the entire population was vaccinated. A 1920 Report of the Philippines Health Services declared, “The 1918 epidemic looks prima facie as a flagrant failure of the classic immunization.” [Ibid., pg. 22]
Once the connection between mass vaccination and the increase in epidemic became more apparent, several countries rescinded the mandatory vaccination laws and even outlawed the practice completely.
The Secretary of the Governing Board in Dublin, Ireland, declared, “Smallpox virus taken from the calf would communicate that disease to the human subject and be thereby a fertile source of propagating the disease, and would, moreover, render the operator liable to prosecution under the Act prohibiting inoculation with smallpox.” [White, W., pg. xxi.]
Australia abolished compulsory vaccinations in the late 1800's, and proceeded to report only 3 cases of smallpox in 15 years. Statistics from England and Wales show an inverse correlation between the percentage of babies vaccinated and the number of smallpox deaths: the greater the number vaccinated, the greater the loss. Deaths from smallpox tumbled after people refused the vaccine. [Official statistics from England and Wales, as reported by Shelton, HM., pg. 22]
In 1884, a massive collection of smallpox data was published by the London Society for the Abolition of Compulsory Vaccination, containing “unbiased vaccine statistics, newspaper stories about people who were damaged by the shot, and legal briefs regarding compulsory laws.”
Even Mahatma Gandhi, although by no means a scientist, would eventually weigh in on the vaccine debate: “I am and have been for years, a confirmed anti-vaccinationist...I have not the least doubt in my mind that vaccination is a filthy process that is harmful in the end.” [Gandhi, MK. Gandhi an Autobiography: Story of My Experiments With Truth (Boston: Beacon PR., 1957)]
The following quotes are from late 18th and early 19th doctors and other health officials who were very vocally skeptical of the claims of the proponents of the smallpox vaccine. They are taken from these sources: Fatality Rates of Small-Pox in the Vaccinated and Unvaccinated by R.P. Garrow, Fatality Rates of Small-Pox in the Vaccinated and Unvaccinated by L.A. Parry, New York Press, (January 26th, 1909), and McBean, E., pp. 21-24; 42, 72.
—Dr. Walter M. James, Philadelphia practitioner
—Dr. Charles E. Page, Boston practitioner
—Dr. F. P. Millard, Toronto practitioner
—Dr. F. Laurie, Medical Director of the Metropolitan Cancer Hospital, London
—B. F. Cornell, M.D., practitioner
—Dr. E. J. Post, Michigan practitioner
—Dr. Dennis Turnbull, 30 year cancer researcher.
—Dr. E. Ripley, Connecticut practitioner
—Dr. Alex Wilder, professor of pathology, Medical College of New York
—Dr. L. A. Parry
—Dr. R. Hall Bakewell, Vaccinator General of Trinidad
—Dr. J. C. Ward, Royal College of Surgeons, England
—Professor A. Vogt, chair of Vita Statistics and Hygiene at Berne University
Many studies were conducted that confirmed that the smallpox was actually dangerous and largely ineffective. In 1915, the U.S. Department of Agriculture linked several foot-and-mouth disease epidemics to the smallpox vaccine. [U.S. Department of Agriculture. Farmer's Bulletin (April 22, 1915):15]
In the mid-1920's, Great Britain authorized the Andrews and then the Rolleston Committee to study post-vaccinal encephalitis and deaths resulting from the smallpox vaccination.
Among the “damaging” results from these reports were that young adults vaccinated against smallpox were five times more likely to die from the disease than the un-vaccinated! It's no wonder that many respectable institutions were beginning to question Jenner and his legacy.
In September 1926, Lancet published data confirming seven cases of encephalomyelitis following smallpox vaccinations. The authors, Turnbull and McIntosh, declared: “There can be no doubt that vaccination was a definite causal factor.”
The next month Lancet reported on 35 cases of encephalitis, including 15 deaths. The authors concluded: “Vaccination was a definite causal factor and no chance coincidence.”
In 1928, the League of Nations issued a report that noted, “The post-vaccinal encephalitis with which we are dealing has become a problem in itself...Their occurrence has led to the realization that a new, or at least a previously unsuspected or unrecognized, risk attaches to the practice of vaccination.”
Later that year, the Journal of the American Medical Association reported on several fatal reactions among children following smallpox vaccination. They were described as having “encephalitic symptoms.” [J of the American Medical Association (April 5, 1930)]
In December of 1952, Lancet published a study documenting the reaction of a woman who was three months pregnant to the vaccine: “She developed a severe primary reaction and three months later she was spontaneously delivered of a feeble hydropic premature infant covered with a very severe generalized vaccinia. The child died 18 hours later.”
Another study determined that 47% of women who were vaccinated during their first trimester failed to give birth to a normal child. [McBean, E., pg. 82.]
These statements come from multiple sources, including:
Miller, H. et al. “Multiple sclerosis and vaccination.” British Medical Journal (April 22, 1967): 210-213.
Neff, JM., et al. “Complications of smallpox vaccination, United States, 1963.” Pediatrics 1967;39:916-923.
Lane, MJ. “Complications of smallpox vaccination” New England Journal of Medicine 1968;281 (22):1201-08.
Spillane, JD., et al. “The neurology of Jennerian vaccination—a clinical account of the neurological complications which occurred during the smallpox epidemic in South Wales in 1962.”
Dick, GWA. “Scientific Proceedings; Symposium on Virus Diseases. 13th Annual Meeting of the British Medical Association, Belfast.” British Medical Journal, 1962;2:319.
Dixon, CW. Smallpox. (London: J & A Churchill, 1962).
Smallpox and AIDS
By the 1980's, a link between contracting AIDS after receiving the smallpox vaccination became apparent: “Primary smallpox immunization of persons with subclinical HIV disease poses a risk of vaccine-induced disease and multiple immunizations may accelerate the progress of HIV disease.”
According to researchers, this raises “concern about the ultimate safety of vaccinia-based vaccine in developing countries where HIV infection is increasing.” [Redfield, R., et al. “Disseminated vaccinia in a military recruit with human immunodeficiency virus (HIV) disease.” New England Journal of Medicine (March 12, 1987):673]
In 1987, shortly after the results of this study were released, the London Times published an incredible report that claimed “the AIDS epidemic may have been triggered by the mass vaccination campaign.” The campaign in question was conducted by the World Health Organization during the 1960s and 1970s, mainly in Africa.
The regions that received the most vaccinations coincided with the areas of the greatest outbreaks of AIDS, including Zaire, Zambia, Tanzania, Uganda, Malawai, Ruanda, and Burundi. Brazil had the highest AIDS rates in South Africa, and they were the only country including in the smallpox vaccination campaign on the entire continent.
According to the WHO advisor, “I thought it was just a coincidence until we studied the latest findings about the reactions which can be caused by vaccinia. Now I believe the smallpox vaccination theory is the explanation of AIDS.”
Dr. Robert Gallo, a pioneering AIDS/HIV researcher, when confronted with this disturbing scenario, did little to alleviate anyone's fears: “I have been saying for some years that the use of live vaccines such as that used for smallpox can activate a dormant infection such as HIV.”
Recent research has also shown that unsterile injections may have done a great deal in contributing to the HIV epidemic in Africa: “We conclude that increased unsterile injecting in Africa during the period 1950-1970 provided the agent for SIV human infections to emerge as epidemic HIV in the modern era.”
Did an attempt to control one disease, smallpox, transform another disease, AIDS, “from a minor endemic illness of the Third World into the current pandemic?”
Monkeypox
Lancet published a report in 1972 that stated that WHO's program to eradicate smallpox “can only be successful in the absence of a non-human reservoir for smallpox virus.”
In 1976, monkeypox antibodies in humans were discovered in Nigeria and the Ivory Coast. The monkeypox virus was indistinguishable by laboratory methods from the smallpox virus.