Introduction

This series hopes to explore the history of British Antivaccinationism and Vaccine Scepticism.  It is divided into 7 main eras: the period of Inoculation, 1721-1798; the introduction of vaccination, 1798-1853; the imposition of mandates, 1853-1898; the remaining history of the National Antivaccination League, 1898-1972; DTP Vaccine Scepticism 1972-1998; Andrew Wakefield and vaccines cause autism, 1998-2019, and Covid 19, 2020 to present. This section will look at the resistance from ordinary people to vaccination during the late 19th century.

The Roots of the NAVL

The National Antivaccination League (NAVL) was founded in 1896. Its roots are in earlier organisations, such as Gibbs’ Anti Compulsory Vaccination League, started in 1866 in London. Afterwards, it became the London Society for the Abolition of Compulsory Vaccination, and then finally the NAVL.

Activities of the League – Publications

The League produced multiple publications over a period of years. They put out one regular publication called the Vaccination Inquirer and Health Review. This publication had started in 1879 by William Tebb and continued as the official publication of the NAVL.

The League also published a significant number of books questioning vaccination. These included books by many notable UK antivaccinationists, such as Maurice Beddow Bayly (who wrote on diphtheria and tuberculosis vaccines) J. T. Biggs (who wrote extensively on Leicester’s vaccination resistance) and Arnold Lupton (an MP opposed to vaccination).

Activities of the League – Advising Parents

The League gave advice to parents on how to avoid vaccination. One example in the Royal College of Surgeons archives, shows a leaflet produced by the League relating to the 1907 vaccination laws, which allowed conscientious objection. The leaflet showed specifically the steps to be taken to avoid vaccination.

Lily Loat – Tireless Antivaccination Activist

One of the key reasons for the successes of the NAVL was its secretary Lily Loat, who is one of the unsung heroes of historical antivaccinationism. She dedicated her life to opposing vaccination and was the secretary of the League for nearly 50 years.

Lily Loat joined the League in 1898, and became Secretary in 1909, and remained in that position until her death in 1958. She was a public voice of antivaccinationists, and also supported antivivisection causes. She also edited the Vaccination Inquirer.

She spoke at public meetings in both the UK and US. A couple of these addresses can be found via whale.to, where she discusses brain injuries caused by vaccination. Loat also wrote a book called The Truth about Vaccination and Immunisation, published in 1951. She worked for the League while sick with her final illness.

Lionel Dole, an antivaccinationist who wrote a book in the 1960s, mentioned Loat’s portrayal in the mainstream media:

The fact that she received no obituary notices whatever from our national newspapers was the highest compliment they could pay her. The only radio tribute to her great work was an oblique smear in a Granada TV serial. It showed two police officers looking with horror under a blanket at the corpse of an old woman recluse who had died of smallpox and who was said to have been a notoriously eccentric crank. Later in the episode, the junior officer remarks that at one time she had “actually started a league for the abolition of compulsory vaccination”; his Chief Inspector replies: “Oh, so it caught up with her!”

Oxford Dictionary of National Biography has a short biography of Loat, it requires a UK library card to access, and I am not sure if it is accessible in the US or elsewhere.

The End of the League

The Vaccination Inquirer ceased publication in 1972. One of the reasons for this was that the League struggled to replace Loat as secretary. Loat’s dedication to the movement was unmatchable.

Conclusion

The NAVL was the most notable organisation opposing vaccination in the first half of the twentieth century. Its demise in 1972 did not end British vaccine scepticism, however. In 1974 a paper would be published by Kulenkampff et al, showing brain injury from DTP vaccines. This would cause the DTP vaccination rate to plummet and begin a new vaccine injury movement.