Independent Media & Commentary from the Cursed Prophetess of Troy
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Author: cassandrasboxmedia
Independent Writer from the UK, blending alternative media perspectives, gender critical views, conspiracy, left wing politics and economics, support for Julian Assange and alternative spirituality.
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, 1853-1902; the remaining history of the National Antivaccination League, 1902-1972; DTP Vaccine Scepticism 1972-1998; Andrew Wakefield and vaccines cause autism, 1998-2019, and Covid 19, 2020 to present. This section forms part 2 looking at Jenner and his critics.
The ‘Discovery’ of Edward Jenner
In 1796, Edward Jenner performed his first vaccination. This was on an 8 year old boy called James Phipps. In this experiment, Jenner inserted into the arm of the boy matter from the teat of a cow with cowpox using a lancet. Cowpox was a disease of the cow’s udder, which caused pustules to appear on that area. It was transmitted to humans via the action of milking a diseased udder.
Jenner’s justification for doing this was that cowpox allegedly prevented smallpox. There had long been a rumour among dairy maids that they could not contract smallpox, if they had contracted cowpox. In fact, the official story or mythology of Edward Jenner states that he overheard this idea from a dairy maid when he was a teenager and was taken with testing it (this is narrated by Jenner’s sycophantic biographer, John Baron).
Jenner became a country doctor in Berkeley, Gloucestershire. He became a member of the Royal Society after writing a paper about cuckoos that was accepted. In 1796, when Jenner performed his first inoculation with vaccine virus (later known as vaccination) he wrote a paper outlining his theory of the origins of cowpox (he believed that it originally came from the horse, and was transferred to the cow via those who dressed diseased horse heels). He then outlined the theory that the cowpox infection prevented the smallpox infection. He used some examples of those he met in his practice who had had a cowpox infection, on whom inoculation (deliberate infection with smallpox) would not ‘take’. The failure of inoculation to take was interpreted as immunity to smallpox. He also outlined his test on James Phipps, first inserting cowpox matter and several weeks later performing inoculation on the boy. As the inoculation did not take Jenner interpreted this as proof of immunity.
The Royal Society rejected Jenner’s paper. They believed it did not have enough evidence to support it and that it might tarnish Jenner’s reputation. Jenner was still determined to publish, so he added more evidence – increasing the number of cases of vaccination. (A detailed discussion of the differences between Jenner’s first and second versions of the paper can be found in Crookshank’s book). He published it in 1798.
Pearson and Woodville
Two important figures took up Jenner’s vaccination idea, George Pearson and William Woodville. Both these doctors were vital in spreading the practise of vaccination and backing it ideologically.
William Woodville was the lead doctor at the Smallpox Hospital in London, so it can be imagined that he had significant influence over the treatment and prevention of smallpox. He took to the idea of vaccination and ran a significant number of tests. Woodville’s tests had many flaws, in particular that he sometimes attempted cowpox and smallpox inoculation very close together. However his testing was more extensive and better documented than Jenner’s.
Pearson sought to set up an institute for vaccination. This annoyed Jenner, as he was not consulted in advance regarding the project. Pearson also distributed vaccine lymph early on in the process to allow other doctors to perform vaccination, which was important as Jenner did not have vaccine lymph to give out on many occasions.
Jenner had a significant number of supporters in the medical profession. When he was put forward for a government reward in 1802, a large number of doctors spoke in his favour. The profession adopted Jenner’s theory very quickly, and it spread widely. This included across Europe, the United States, as well as many colonised countries.
Jenner’s Critics
Jenner had three main critics of his theory when it was first published. These three men were Benjamin Moseley, John Birch, and William Rowley. None of these men were antivaccination in the sense that we would understand this term today, i.e. they were not opposed to all artificial inculcating of disease. They were supporters of the old method of inoculation and sceptical of Jenner’s attempt to replace it. At this time, there were no high profile critics of both inoculation and vaccination (this tendency would only develop post vaccination mandate, from 1853).
These three men opposed the award to Jenner by the British government during the hearing on this issue in 1802.
Benjamin Moseley
Moseley was a doctor who was well known for other writings prior to his involvement in the vaccination controversy, in particular writings relating to the Caribbean.
He opposed Jenner’s method early on, and published more than one book relating to the issue. He considered that a ‘cowpox mania’ had taken over the medical profession. In his book, A Treatise on the Luis Bovilla, Or Cow Pox, he made several arguments. He stated there was no affinity between cowpox and smallpox, so there was no specific property of cowpox which meant it could prevent smallpox. He also argued that cowpox was not necessarily a mild disease. He pointed to the ulceration that often accompanied the practise.
John Birch
John Birch was a surgeon who was opposed to vaccination. In his text, Serious Reasons for objecting to the Practice of Vaccination he discusses the Royal Commitee on Vaccination. He argued that there was a large number of vaccine failures but that most of these were not admitted, and that the Committee tried to soften the language by stating that these cases only apparently had cowpox.
William Rowley
William Rowley was an active practitioner of inoculation. As such it could be said that he had a degree of vested interest in defending the practise against the new threat of vaccination. He considered inoculation to be a very safe practise that rarely led to death when performed competently. Vaccination, on the other hand, he considered both dangerous and ineffective.
Rowley authored a work called ‘Cow Pox No Security Against Smallpox Infection‘. This book has been considered a target of mockery by vaccinationists due to a couple of the images included in the book. These images claimed to show vaccination injuries, but as Rowley had titled one of them ‘The Ox Faced Boy’ he was mocked for making a linkage between vaccination and people becoming bovine.
Rowley actually collected a large number of cases, including with address details so at the time they could be checked, of vaccination injury, death, and cases of smallpox after vaccination.
He also provides an extensive list of excuses used by vaccinationists to defend their theory. These included the theory of ‘spurious cowpox’, which was outlined by Jenner in his second essay on cowpox. The idea of a ‘real’ and a ‘spurious’ cowpox allowed any cases of failure to be assigned to a spurious vaccination. He also accused vaccinationists of misdiagnosis of cases of smallpox in vaccinated people. He also states that vaccinationists formulated the excuse that even if cowpox failed to prevent the disease, it made it milder.
Conclusion
Vaccination had some significant opposition. However, it is fair to say that it had very little ideological opposition at this time. Its opponents thought it was unsafe and ineffective but advocated the earlier practise of inoculation instead rather than rejecting both. Well founded ideological opposition to vaccination would have to wait until after 1853 – the year of the UK’s smallpox vaccine mandate.
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, 1853-1902; the remaining history of the National Antivaccination League, 1902-1972; DTP Vaccine Scepticism 1972-1998; Andrew Wakefield and vaccines cause autism, 1998-2019, and Covid 19, 2020 to present. This section forms part 1, looking at the inoculators and their critics.
The History of Inoculation
Inoculation was the practise of deliberately infecting someone with smallpox. The theory behind the practise was that a person could only get smallpox once, and would then get what we would call natural immunity. Although this concept was not understood, it was observed that smallpox was only contracted once. As such, by selecting the time and place of infection, and by carrying out additional practices such as the following of certain diets, smallpox could be rendered a milder disease with a greater chance of survival.
Lady Mary Wortley Montagu observed the practise of inoculation in Turkey and had one of her children inoculated while over there. She introduced the practise to her physician, Charles Maitland, who was taken with the idea and began to practise inoculation on willing members of the elite. There was a brief fad for this practise initially, but the first wave of enthusiasm died out quite quickly, and the number of inoculations performed was still very small. Some doctors tried to collect scientific data relaying to inoculation, such as Jurin, who attempted to figure out the death rate from inoculation versus the death rate from natural smallpox infection – he calculated it at about one in 50 for inoculation versus 1 in 6 for the natural disease. On this basis, he argued for the supremacy of inoculation but acknowledged that it had some risk.
Inoculation became more widely practised later on in the 18th century and particularly in the second half of that century, with the rise of the Suttonian method of inoculation, which was less harsh on the body. Daniel Sutton was able to widely promote his method among elites, and inoculation became more popular. The Suttonian method was that in practise before it was replaced by the cowpoxing method associated with Edward Jenner.
The Masseys – The Original Anti Vaccinationists
In response to the introduction of inoculation, two men, Isaac and Edward Massey, brought objections to the table against the new practise. They could be considered the original antivaccinationists. Each of the Masseys put forward a different approach to the issue.
Edmund Massey’s religious objections
Edmund Massey was a Christian clergyman at a church in London, and he objected to inoculation on religious grounds. He preached a notable sermon in 1722 against the new practise which was distributed in written format. The first argument he uses against inoculation is that it is forbidden for man to deliberately inflict disease. He states that while the Bible furnishes examples of men healing when given divine power, there are no examples of men directly inflicting disease. Instead, God inflicts disease to test people’s faith and to punish sin. He raised the book of Job as an example of this.
Isaac Massey’s scientific objections
Isaac Massey raised scientific objections to inoculation. He was an apocethary (which was quite vaguely defined but involved working in the medical profession). In his book, A Short and Plain Account of Inoculation, he raised several different scientific objections to the practise. For example, he claimed that those who were inoculated were not necessarily getting genuine smallpox. He pointed out that it was an uncertain procedure, despite the claims of the inoculators to the contrary that factors such as age and the time of year can be controlled.
He stated that inoculation was ‘a disease of their own making and procurement’. He argued that when true smallpox is spread by inoculation, it can also spread to other people, such as in the case of the inoculation of Mary Batt, which spread smallpox and led to the death of a servant. He argued for living a sober lifestyle as a means to reduce the risk from smallpox.
In his book addressing Jurin’s statistical claims, he argues that Jurin did not allow for factors such as age, disease and poverty when calculating comparative death rates. Most who would have been inoculated when Massey was writing would have been elites, who would have had a better rate of survival from natural smallpox due to more adequate nutrition and being less likely to live in complete squalor. He thus considered that Jurin was not comparing like with like. He also pointed out that inoculation may spread other diseases. He pointed out that the initial claims of the inoculators was that the procedure was harmlessly and that this had to be revised when deaths occurred.
Conclusion
The objections to inoculation did not prevent the practise from eventually becoming widespread in certain elite circles. Inoculation formed the ideological basis for Jenner’s much more well known vaccination practise.
Back in February 2023, I wrote about a case from Jersey, where a severely autistic man injured by the MMR vaccine was being forced to take the Covid vaccine against the will of his parents. He was too severely autistic to make his own decision regarding the vaccine. The care home where he was living had denied him certain activities and essentially kept him in isolation from the other residents because he was not vaccinated.
Amother has launched a legal battle to stop the state from spiking her Down’s syndrome son’s drinks with sedatives so he can be jabbed with the Covid vaccine, The Telegraph can reveal.
Cups of tea and glasses of orange juice have been secretly laced with sedatives to subdue the man, in his thirties, so he can be given the vaccine and booster jabs.
I don’t have words for how utterly disgusting and repulsive this is. The people doing this are either psychopaths, or so sick in the head off the high of vaccinationism that they cannot even comprehend moral values any more.
Despite all the side effects of the covid vaccine, they are still pushing the ‘benefits outweigh the risks’ narrative as a justification to push the vaccine.
Here is a description of how the forced sedation was carried out from the above article.
As a “thank you” for having a mug of breakfast tea and a glass of orange juice brought into his room, Adam invariably hugged the staff he trusts so implicitly at his care home.
Unbeknown to him, on five separate occasions over the last 16 months those drinks were laced with a “covert anxiolytic medication” – a powerful sedative. Twice he became groggy before eventually succumbing to a deep sleep.
Each time, a team of senior carers, a nurse and the home’s manager stood quietly outside the room awaiting the nod to enter. One of them was armed with a syringe – kept well hidden due to Adam’s needle phobia – loaded with the Covid vaccine.
When the sedatives worked, Adam’s sleeve was quickly rolled up, the antiseptic wipe swiped over his upper arm and the needle inserted deep into his muscle as the plunger was pressed emptying the syringe barrel of its viscous contents. One carer made copious notes in readiness for a report which would be sent to the Court of Protection explaining how the procedure had gone.
The article further states that when Adam was given information relating to the vaccine, he said no to the vaccine.
Recently, I have spent a lot of time thinking about the issue of complicity in evil. The truth is, every person on this planet is complicit in evil regardless of their intentions. This can be to a greater or lesser degree but it is the case for everyone. Systems require people to participate in them to survive. People require to participate in systems to survive. As such, there is a mutual interlocking complex of evil in which people are complicit, but also cannot escape complicity.
Here are some thoughts on the below institutions that we are complicit in, how we serve them, and what they are responsible for.
The Government
The first institution is the most obvious, the government. We contribute to the government via the mechanism of taxes (taxes on wages, pensions, VAT, etc). We also may contribute via voting for political parties (which helps to serve certain narratives about the governments, in that they are ‘legitimate’ because people ‘chose’ them). In return the evil actions that governments are involved in are endless – the most notable being wars, the arms trade (fueling foreign wars), authoritarian policies and oppression, and the promotion of allopathic medical treatments (including but not limited to vaccines) that cause harm.
Corporations
We contribute to corporations via purchasing from them. It is not just the individual purchase but also the complexities of supply chain which is behind the purchase. This drives complicity in abuse of workers and also abuse of the environment – toxic chemicals being dumped into rivers, etc.
Banks
We contribute to banks by taking out loans such as for a mortgage and paying back with interest. Savings and pension funds also contribute to banks as part of their holdings which they can use to invest. This drives complicity in both corporations and governments as banks invest in those institutions and prop them up as one of their primary functions.
Work
We contribute to work by giving our time and energy to a job in order to continue to survive in this corrupt system. The exact nature of the complicity involved will depend on the job role but could involve complicity in wars, environmental spoilage, allopathic medical harm, etc. Even if the job does not involve these specifically, the institution will be paying taxes to the government, and will be involved in supply chain.
The Media
We contribute to the media by purchasing physical media, but mainly though clicks and advertisements. The media contributes to the system by performing narrative control functions.
NGOs and Religion
People contribute their money and time to NGOs and religious organisations. While there may be local organisations that are not directly corrupt (everything is indirectly corrupt), large organisations of this type tend to be in with the official authorities and also directly corrupt (donations for earthquake relief in Haiti not going towards Haitians, for example). These institutions are involved in direct corruption with money, but also in narrative control operations.
Balancing the Books
The most dark conclusion I can draw from all this is simply that we live in a world where it is impossible to be moral, and only possible to be immoral. As such, we are always going to end up with a negative balance of good done to evil when we weigh up our lives. I see no escape from this conclusion.
I started withdrawing from SSRI pills (aka ‘antidepressants’) in November 2022. This is a documentation of the different side effects I have experienced since attempting to withdraw from the drugs.
Simply, I do have an agenda when it comes to this post, that is to prevent people going anywhere near these pills. They’re extremely hard to get off because of the side effects. As such, forget all the legal disclaimers about ‘This is not medical advice’. This is definitely medical advice to avoid these alleged allopathic ‘solutions’.
Currently I am taking around 7.5mg of these drugs. It’s difficult to tell exactly because I have had to resort to an emery board to shave the pills down to reduce the dose because cutting them up reduces the dose too fast. I hope to do a follow up post in the future documenting how to get off the drugs successfully (but of course I can’t write that yet and I don’t want to tempt fate).
A final note: this is only for side effects I have experienced personally. Other people may have different or worse ones. This is an honest documentation so there are a few uncomfortable topics here. Discretion advised.
Physical Side Effects
One of the physical side effects of withdrawal is what I consider a compulsion to twitch or shake. For example, feeling like I need to shake my legs up and fown with my foot on the floor. I would say it’s not out of my control – it’s not involuntary in that I can make it stop. But it doesn’t feel entirely voluntary either.
This is one of the more minor effects for me that mainly affected me at the start of withdrawal in November and December 2022.
Phantom Sensation
This is a much worse side effect. It affects what feels like inside my brain. It feels like someone is physically pressing down on my brain. Alternatively it feels like ants crawling in my brain. I find this effect hard to deal with and distract myself from.
Sexual Side Effects
It is a well known fact that SSRIs suppress sex drive (this is separate from post SSRI sexual dysfunction). As such I expected my sex drive to be affected by withdrawal. There is an increase in sex drive, but this isn’t exactly a side effect because that is the sex drive getting back to normal. But I have experienced essentially overcompensation.
Emotional Instability
My moods can be all over the place including changing rapidly. I can sit there and be normal and then everything goes to hell. I get ‘attacks’ where I basically end up in bed having to try and calm myself down. Or I end up on the floor.
Apathy
This means what it says – inability to want to do anything. You may have noticed that I get quite passionate about things. I don’t really feel neutral all that much. I am used to being a miserable bastard. I know what to do with that at this point. Not so much with apathy and complete lack of motivation.
Suicidal Thoughts and Hallucinations
I have had significant suicidal thoughts since withdrawing from these pills. I’m used to suicidal thoughts in themselves (due to my vaccine injury). But these ones have an intensity and violence to them that is new. It is like, for example, that while I don’t see anything, I sense my own blood surrounding me. My brain has a fixation on blood – I had an extreme reaction to a tiny finger cut. I have also experienced hallucinations telling me to kill myself in violent ways.
At some point, some way along the feeding and spitting out of your maw, there will be too many of us. So many of us that your society heaves with it, sickens with it, dies with it. Your workers and your armies are no longer fit but cared for by broken backs, hands that could carve can only smash.
It was a mistake, you’ll say, and maybe it’s true that those first sputters of the so called little professors were some sort of accident. That the first screams were unforeseen. But plausible deniability starts to run thin when acres of us emerge from the paediatrician’s lair. When even members of your own state that there is some connection worth digging out among the filth. You just pasted on more layers and let it escalate.
Why create us? Filth breeds filth, money breeds money. To many of you, we are just the outcome of the pay cheque, the tax on your conscience to match your national insurance. To some we are much more and much less than that. The moment of creation, to perform the insemination. A secret thrill like public copulation. Except a man can create more with needles than with sperm, make Genghis Khan look an amateur.
Do you ever wish to boast of your creation? That thrill of confession, the denouement? To stare us in the eye and state ‘I did it?’ Foolish, yes, I know. It would be the moment of triumph then downfall, like the braying of a killer condemned to the noose. So instead you’re left with sordid little lies. Lies that wouldn’t hold up your ceiling if people dared to look.
When you created me, you made a mistake. You took too much to use me as your poster girl, too little to completely destroy me.
One of the key aspects to vaccination is the aspect of ritual. The public practice and promotion of this ritual during the Covid-19 ‘pandemic’ shows some similarities with a previous public vaccination mass participation event: the Salk vaccine trials in the 1950s.
An Overhyped Disease
Without getting into the detail of what caused poliomyelitis (paralytic polio), whether it was the poliovirus, pesticides like DDT, both, or something else, the risks were generally overstated. If we go with the virus theory, the vast majority of people infected with the poliovirus had no symptoms even on the official version. For example, the NHS website states:
This was historically known as well. For example, an article published in 1916 states:
In a large aggregation of people, such as the population of a city with over 100,000 inhabitants, a county, or a State, epidemics seldom attack more than one in a thousand of the population, often not more than one in two to four thousand.
Objectively, many other diseases killed more people than polio did, even given that poliomyelitis could be fatal.
Covid-19 was also an overexaggerated threat. The government and media promoted the idea that Covid-19 was so dangerous that it justified lockdowns, forced masks and experimental ‘vaccine’ technologies. However, reality does not match that apocalyptic vision. In reality, excess deaths in the UK only increased after lockdowns were introduced, not before:
Unlike poliomyelitis, which mainly affected children, Covid-19 deaths were mainly among the elderly. It was rare for young and healthy people to die from Covid-19. The number of deaths from Covid-19 were exaggerated by media, by defining Covid-19 death as ‘death within 28 days of a positive test’ regardless of cause:
Science Saves the Day
In both of these cases, heroic vaccine scientists were portrayed as fighting the evil disease through their ingenuity. The key difference would be that in the case of polio, there was more focus on Jonas Salk, the creator of the first polio vaccine to be used on a mass scale, as an individual. Whereas, in the case of Covid-19, the inventors behind the vaccine were not mentioned, with the names invoked being that of pharmaceutical companies. This may indicate a changing of the times, in that science in general has come to rely much less on the individual ‘heroic inventor’ and more on mass bureaucracy.
Rushed Vaccine Approvals
Both vaccinations also had rushed approvals. After the success of the vaccine was announced at a press conference, the FDA approved the vaccine immediately. The Covid vaccines also had extremely short trial periods, but were pushed through under Emergency Use Authorisation under the guise of a ‘pandemic’ in the US and later formally approved.
Mass Participation
One of the key comparisons between these two vaccines was the opportunity for mass participation they provided. This was not just some sort of out there ‘science’ but a real opportunity to participate in the ritual aspects of vaccination practice. There are two key differences: in the Salk vaccine, the mass participation event was the clinical trial, whereas in the Covid case, the mass participation event was the roll out of the vaccine in December 2020. In the Salk case, the participants were children, whereas in the Covid case the participants during the initial furore were adults.
The Salk vaccine had a large number of participants:
Across the United States, 623 972 schoolchildren were injected with vaccine or placebo, and more than a million others participated as “observed” controls.
Children were put forward to participate in the trials by their parents, and were called the ‘Polio Pioneers’. They were given badges and certificates as a reward for being injected with the vaccine:
With Covid-19, the mass participation aspect, and the elements of ritualism, came after the clinical trials rather than before. Images were shown of people receiving vaccines, including seemingly gimmicky stories about a man named William Shakespeare receiving a Covid vaccine (complete with imagery).
Because Covid-19 vaccines allowed for adult participation, social media images were used as a means to demonstrate participation in the ritual of vaccination. Ordinary people were given options on platforms like Facebook to put a ‘I’ve had my Covid-19 Vaccine’ banner on their profile as a form of showing that they had taken part in the vaccine ritual.
Both of these strategies for vaccine promotion were dependent on mass technologies that reach the entire country. Mass newspapers, television, and social media were required to sustain this message. But they also required individuals (or their parents) to opt in to this ritual performance on the basis of this propaganda.
In both cases, we see this initial enthusiasm is not maintained. Many people gave up taking Covid vaccines after the first booster, and enthusiasm for the Salk vaccine also waned quickly. Problems such as the Cutter incident, in which the vaccine caused poliomyelitis, caused scepticism. In the US, it was replaced by the Sabin vaccine after this vaccine was field tested in countries like the USSR.
Conclusion
Vaccine campaigns in the 20th and 21st centuries have used mass media as a strategy to create emotional linkage to the idea of taking a vaccine. Encouragement to participate in such events are a means of manipulating the public into vaccination. The idea of ‘being part of’ such a mass project by opting in provides meaning and purpose, and allows the individual to believe that they are playing a part in the banishment of evil.
Since the 1990s, the idea of ‘neurodiversity’ has become a cottage industry. The basic tenet of neurodiversity is that autism is a perfectly normal variation of human development that should not be seen as a negative trait. It seeks to highlight the alleged ‘positive’ traits of autism and believes that the struggles of people with autism are largely caused by society not being accepting rather than the inherent downsides of the condition. This article will seek to discuss three parts of this phenomenon by comparing two theories of autism: the neurodiversity theory of autism and the iatrogenic theory of autism i.e. vaccine injury. The first part will discuss the evidence for each theory, concluding that vaccine injury has a large amount of evidence to support it. The second part of this article will look at the individuals and institutions that promote each theory and how the media portrays each group. The third part will draw it together by explaining how the neurodiversity theory is constructed as an alternative to deflect from the vaccine injury theory and to gaslight people suffering with autistic vaccine-injury and their parents about their experiences.
Part I: Two Theories
There are two main theories of autism. The first theory states that autism is genetic, and the second theory states that autism is iatrogenic. The first theory is advocated by both people who think that autism is a good thing, and by those who think it is a bad thing. The latter group of people, who believe that autism is a net negative but who also believe it is genetic, will not be discussed in this article. Instead we will be comparing the ‘autism is a positive, genetic gift’ group (the ‘neurodiversity’ group) to the ‘autism is iatrogenic, largely caused by vaccination’ group (the ‘vaccine-injury theory’ group). Part I will outline these two theories and look at the evidence.
The Neurodiversity Theory of Autism
What is the ‘neurodiversity’ theory of autism? It can be summed up by saying that autism is not a disability, it is a difference that should be celebrated. If you search for ‘neurodiversity’ you can find all sorts of articles advocating for this. Here’s one picked at random:
Neurodiversity is a movement that wants to change the way we think about autism. It rejects the idea that autism is a disorder and sees it instead as a neurological difference: one with a unique way of thinking and experiencing the world.
The movement focuses on celebrating neurological diversity and championing the different world-views and skills that autistic, dyslexic, bipolar, and other neurodiverse people have.
The idea of ‘neurodiversity’ has been increasing in popularity as a paradigm to ‘explain’ autism.
Of course, saying that autism is a positive trait does not explain it. So neurodiversity theorists use genetics to explain autism.
I will argue that both sides of the neurodiversity coin are false: having autism is always a negative thing, and that genetics does not explain autism.
Let’s start with the genetics aspect. One significant piece of evidence that the autism-is-genetic advocates use is twin studies:
Since the first autism twin study in 1977, several teams have compared autism rates in twins and shown that autism is highly heritable. When one identical twin has autism, there is about an 80 percent chance that the other twin has it too. The corresponding rate for fraternal twins is around 40 percent.
On the surface, twin studies look like exceedingly convincing evidence. They have been used to argue for a genetic link for a varying range of problems, including schizophrenia. In reality, though, twin studies are not good evidence that autism is genetic.
The problem that we run into is that twins are likely to have had the same environmental exposure, and this is doubly true when it comes to vaccination. No parent is going to vaccinate one of their twins and not vaccinate the other in some sort of science experiment. Thus both twins will be getting very similar exposure to aluminium, thimerosal, etc. via vaccinations. (Though see this caveat: aluminium levels in vaccination can vary significantly when vials are actually examined). The other major issue with twin studies is that they conclude that interaction between the body and these kinds of exposures is ‘genetic’. A genetic propensity to, say, accumulate certain toxins may well exist in autism cases. But in order for autism to develop, exposure to the toxin is required, and exposure to a toxin is not genetic. The same weakness applies when looking at alleged genes that have been associated with autism – it could be that those genes simply predispose a person to toxin accumulation.
The main weakness in the genetic case for autism is below:
It goes without saying that human genes have not radically changed since 1970. So how can the autism rates have changed so drastically? Autism-is-genetic advocates have tried their best to explain this graph, but they have done a bad job of it, because the whole graph screams ‘environmental causes’. But let’s have a look at their explanations for an increase in autism.
The main explanation offered is that the definition of autism has got wider and that is why these numbers have increased so much. Intuitively, this is a really poor explanation, for a number of reasons. For a start, we are looking a massive, massive increase. 1 in 10,000 to 1 in 30 is huge. To explain this simply by stating ‘it’s increased diagnosis’ is intuitively and logically implausible. People who argue this, I think, don’t understand how large a proportion of the population 3% is. That is a very significant chunk of the population. Older people here can employ their common sense. Were 3% or more of your childhood colleagues autistic? If you doubt that you could tell, I assure you that you can with just a little thought. Poor eye contact is a dead giveaway for autism, as is just an obvious awkwardness. The reality is, even ‘high functioning’ autistic people just seem odd, weird and off in particular ways so I would say you could almost always tell. Furthermore, the unemployment rate for people with autism, according to UK government data, is 78%. If we approximate the data, if 1 in 30 people are autistic and 2/3 (being generous) cannot work, this means around 2% of the population cannot work due to autism. The idea that government institutions never noticed 2% of the population being unemployable due to autism is laughably implausible.
This hypothesis also does not fit the shape of the graph very well. It keeps curving upwards, rather than seeing a bump for a change in diagnostic criteria and a levelling. The graph has still not levelled off. At some point, you have to start asking questions.
This issue also becomes more difficult to cover up when you consider severe autism. Autistic people who have a basic level of functioning in the ‘real world’ may just come across to normal people as a bit weird. In these people’s case, it’s more possible that they may not have a diagnosis. This would not be the case with those with severe autistic deficits. Again this is another argument that is just absurd on the face of it:
You can’t have missed 97 percent of the children in the ’80s who had autism. They’re trying to get the public to believe that kids who spin in circles, don’t speak, don’t socialize, can’t go to the bathroom by themselves all existed in our public high schools and elementary schools in the ’80s but only today have gotten a proper diagnosis. It’s incomprehensible.
Aside from being intuitively implausible, one study on this issue concluded:
In summary, the incidence of autism rose 7- to 8-fold in California from the early 1990s through the present. Quantitative analysis of the changes in diagnostic criteria, the inclusion of milder cases, and an earlier age at diagnosis during this period suggests that these factors probably contribute 2.2-, 1.56-, and 1.24-fold increases in autism, respectively, and hence cannot fully explain the magnitude of the rise in autism.
But what about the claim that autism is always a net negative? Surely that’s a little bit fundamentalist? After all, some of the advocates of the neurodiversity theory are autistic themselves, right, and surely they would know? So let’s tackle this thorny question.
The most obvious piece of evidence to start with is life expectancy. The evidence demonstrates that autism significantly decreases life expectancy. This is pretty mainstream evidence that can be found with a quick search.
One study, published in the American Journal of Public Health in April 2017, finds the life expectancy in the United States of those with ASD to be 36 years old as compared to 72 years old for the general population.
In other words, according to this study autism halves life expectancy.
The other study was published by the British Journal of Psychiatry in January 2018. This was a Swedish study showing similar results but elaborating on other causes of death as well. This study showed a life expectancy in those with ASD with a cognitive disability (or a learning disability) at 39.5 years versus 70 years for the general population studied. Those with ASD without a learning disability had an average age of death at about 58 years.
Furthermore, most of these causes of death are inherent to autism. For example, being much more likely to die in an accident. Autistic people have poor motor control and are much more likely to have these kinds of accidents such as drowning that lead to death. Horrific anxiety at normal experiences, such as sensory issues around normal noise/light/smell stimuli, also increases mortality as the body becomes overwhelmed with the constant anxiety triggers, meaning that the body’s ability to fight cancers is impaired, and heart attack and stroke risk is increased. People with autism are also unemployed/unemployable, with only about 20% of autistic people even being employed in the UK. This is linked to having awful social skills, having severe anxiety, and in some cases being completely non verbal and non functional. Being perennially unemployable is bad for your health; higher unemployment rates have been well established to be linked to mortality in sociology.
A study that followed autistic people for 20 years showed even more negative outcomes, although most of the participants also had other intellectual disabilities.
The outcome data was grim, showing pervasive inability to live independently, hold a job, or manage money. Few became independent, with 99% unable to live independently. Of those, 70% lived at home with relatives, 21% lived in disability homes in the community, and 8% in residential facilities. A mere 3.7% attained postsecondary education, about half of those representing certificates from college disability programs. While the majority were considered incapable of holding a job in the competitive workspace, some worked in disability workshops or other sheltered positions. Most participants were incapable of handling money, even with caretaker assistance, with only 9.5% considered capable.
The neurodiversity paradigm likes to attempt to escape from this reality by claiming that this is purely down to ‘society’ refusing to accept us. That argument is nonsense. The argument is most obviously flawed when it comes to those with severe autism, since any range of accommodations will not fix deficits such as being non verbal, not being able to go to the toilet by yourself, seizures (comorbid with autism), extremely poor motor control, severe gastroenterological issues (linked to autism), sensory issues and meltdowns, etc. If a neurodiversity advocate would like to explain how ‘acceptance’ will fix these problems, the comment section is all theirs. But it is even pretty much nonsense when it comes to ‘high functioning’ autism as well. The reality is ‘acceptance’ and accommodations only really make a difference in edge cases when it comes to solving the issues outlined above. Take for example ability to work. The severely impaired autistic person will never be able to work, you can throw all the accommodations in the world at the issue, it’s not going to happen. Whereas, a high functioning or borderline high functioning autistic person may be able to work if given a few accommodations. I’m not arguing against accommodations. What I am arguing against is the idea that accommodations, or society being more accepting of autism will fix our problems. It won’t.
As for the supposed ‘positive’ aspects of autism, what are they? Usually, it is claimed that many people with autism are more intelligent and analytical than normal people. However, this is likely to confuse correlation and causation. The most plausible explanation here is that brain development is more likely to be disrupted by toxins in the case of intelligent people due to more dense neuron growth in highly intelligent people. And again, severe cases of autism are erased by this view. It glorifies a very narrow spectrum of individuals with autistic injury – the ‘autistic savant’ – while writing off the harms done to the rest.
So what about the people with autism diagnoses who make the claim that autism is a positive thing and that neurodiversity is valid? Well, if someone with an autism diagnosis saying something settles the question, then autism is a devastating vaccine-injury that destroys and obscures the true personality of the individual, rather than reflecting it. Because of course this author has an autism diagnosis. So this kind of argument gets us nowhere.
The Vaccine-Injury Theory of Autism
There is an alternative, ‘underground’ theory of autism which advocates for the view that autism is (at least primarily) caused by vaccination. This article will discuss one cause of autism that the author believes has been comprehensively documented, that is aluminium adjuvants in vaccination entering the brain, disrupting the housekeeping cells of the brain (glia and microglia)and triggering inflammatory reactions such as the il-6 pathway. This is not to say that there are no other problems with vaccination as it relates to autism or no other possible causes (e.g. thimerosal). This article will stick to one cause for reasons of length and clarity.
I will go into a little bit more detail on the basic theory, before discussing the evidence. Aluminium is used in ~80% of vaccines as an adjuvant (substance used to promote an immune response). It is in the vast majority of childhood vaccines, excluding the MMR. However, aluminium is also a neurotoxin that the body cannot filter out effectively when injected, and because of this it can enter the brain. In short, the mechanism of how the injury occurs is like this. The aluminium in a vaccine is injected into the body. Immune cells are stimulated to respond to the site of injection. These immune cells (macrophages) respond and ‘swallow’ the aluminium. But when any inflammatory event in the brain occurs, these cells will be called upon to help, but instead will bring a massive payload of toxic aluminium with them into the brain.
A set of nine criteria used to determine the strength of an association between a disease and its supposed causative agent. They form the basis of modern medical and dental epidemiological research.
The more of the Bradford-Hill criteria you can demonstrate, the more likely it is that A causes B. Let’s look at these criteria with relevance to the fact that vaccines cause autism.
The first factor we can discuss is coherence. In other words, “does the association fit with other facts?” In the case of the above theory, it fits very well with facts about aluminium.
Aluminium is toxic to the human body. Aluminium has no biological function in human life and so its presence in the human body is always a net negative. The idea than aluminium, at least, can be toxic is widely accepted. Furthermore, it is accepted that aluminium can enter into brain tissue. Even more than this, it is accepted that it can cause harm once it gets into the brain tissue. One form of aluminium toxicity where this occurs has been observed in dialysis patients:
[A]luminium toxicity occurs due to contamination of dialysis solutions, and treatment of the patients with aluminium-containing phosphate binding gels. Aluminium has been shown to be the major contributor to the dialysis encephalopathy [“damage or disease that affects the brain”] syndrome and an osteomalacic component of dialysis osteodystrophy.
In stating this so far, I haven’t deviated from accepted science. Slightly more controversial than this is the idea that Alzheimer’s is caused by aluminium in the brain. This idea has been around since 1965 according to the Alzheimer’s Society. Although some people doubt the correlation-causation relationship (I would argue more for financial reasons than scientific), there is evidence from a wide range of sources.
The Scotsman reported on a study performed by researchers looking at aluminium levels in drinking water that found people in areas with higher levels of aluminium were more likely to die of dementia. The study’s author said:
We still see this well accepted finding that higher levels of aluminium in particular are associated with an increased risk of dementia. It’s confirmatory rather than anything else. [my emphasis]
Dr. Chris Exley has done multiple studies showing high levels of aluminium in the brains of those who died with a diagnosis of Alzheimer’s disease.
Animal studies also provide further evidence for the fact that aluminium in injurious to the brain. Dr. Christopher Exley observed, when he was studying fish, that when the fish were exposed to aluminium, they would start hanging out in the corner of the tank. Another study, performed by a sheep farmer (and shown in the Bert Ehgartner documentary, Under the Skin), showed that sheep injected with aluminium adjuvant (even without an antigen) showed much higher levels of aggressive behaviour and did things like grind their teeth on metal railings. Mice are also negatively affected by aluminium:
Male mice in the “high Al” group showed significant changes in light–dark box tests and in various measures of behaviour in an open field. Female mice showed significant changes in the light–dark box at both doses, but no significant changes in open field behaviours.
Thus, aluminium was clearly affecting the neurochemistry of the animals, and these behaviours are decent proxies for autistic symptoms in humans (aggression being analogous to autistic meltdowns and the fish acting strangely being analogous to social avoidance).
All of this evidence is a strong case that the aluminium factor in autism is coherent. We know aluminium is toxic and can harm the brain. Therefore that it can cause the kind of behavioural issues that we observe in autism cannot be prima facie ruled out. This is Criteria 1 on our Bradford Hill list solidly met.
The next criteria we can discuss is dose-response relationship. In short, if we give more aluminium adjuvants to children, do we see an increase in autism? Recall our graph from above – the 1-in-10000 to the 1-in-36 increase in autism prevalence. Now let’s compare this to the increase in aluminium adjuvants and thus exposure.
Shaw and Tomljenovic wrote a paper addressing this topic:
By applying Hill’s criteria for establishing causality between exposure and outcome we investigated whether exposure to Al from vaccines could be contributing to the rise in ASD prevalence in the Western world. Our results show that: (i) children from countries with the highest ASD prevalence appear to have the highest exposure to Al from vaccines; (ii) the increase in exposure to Al adjuvants significantly correlates with the increase in ASD prevalence in the United States observed over the last two decades (Pearson r=0.92, p<0.0001); and (iii) a significant correlation exists between the amounts of Al administered to preschool children and the current prevalence of ASD in seven Western countries, particularly at 3-4 months of age (Pearson r=0.89-0.94, p=0.0018-0.0248).
The correlation here is strong – more doses, more autism. The dose-response relationship is in this data. Point 2 on the Bradford Hill Criteria list is met.
The third factor that we can discuss is strength of association. Or in other words, how much is the difference in observed rates of autism between the vaccinated and the unvaccinated? This question is not all that easy to answer, mostly because information on this kind of question has been suppressed.
Dr. Paul Thomas has revealing evidence on this question.
Dr. Paul Thomas is the most successful doctor in the world at preventing autism. Data from his practice show:
If zero vaccines, autism rate = 1 in 715;
If alternative vaccine schedule, autism rate = 1 in 440;
If CDC vaccine schedule, autism rate = 1 in 36.
[…]His alternative vaccine schedule reduces autism risk by more than 1200%. However even an alternative vaccine schedule increases autism risk by 160% versus no vaccines at all.
The difference between 1 in 715 and 1 in 36 is huge. This is evidence of a significant strength of association between two factors. Of course the historical evidence showing fewer cases of autism among older people and more among the young with a strong correlation also matches up with this evidence, since older people are comparatively ‘unvaccinated’. So that’s our third criteria met.
The fourth factor we can discuss is temporal relationship. In other words, the effect must follow, not precede exposure. This factor is difficult to elucidate with vaccines, because exposure is so early on in life, including in the first day of life in the US. This is used by the vaccine cult to argue for the genetic position, but also ensures that it is more difficult to prove that exposure causes the symptoms because the exposure is so early and rampant. However, the simple observation of vaccines preceding autism is almost always true (unless the child is unvaccinated) because if you expose the child at day 1 (US) or 2 months (UK) that is before autistic behaviour is observed. So in a way, their rampant pushing of vaccinations has met this criteria all by itself.
We also haveanecdotal evidencefor this factor, that is, parents observing their child regressing into autism after vaccination. Of course, anecdotal evidence is automatically dismissed by any Pharma apologist. It is true that when using anecdotal evidence, there are significant pitfalls to consider. People can misremember things, or actively lie. These points are worthy of consideration.
However, both of these risks are minimised in the case of assessing autistic regression after vaccination. In terms of lying, there is simply no motive for a parent to lie about observation of regression into autism after a vaccine. Suggesting to a paediatrician, for example, that a child’s autism was caused by a vaccine will lead to being attacked and dismissed by the doctor. Parents are also attacked in the media if they suggest this idea, such as in the case of Jenny McCarthy, who has been subject to hit pieces because she stated that the MMR vaccine caused her son’s autism. Although vaccine advocates state that parents are likely to fall for the idea that someone is to blame for their child’s autism (such as doctors or Pharma) this is also unlikely. The parents had to consent for the vaccine to be given, and so you would expect to observe the opposite: parents denying that vaccines cause autism, since then they would have to blame themselves for consenting to the vaccine(s) and human beings do not like to acknowledge guilt.
Being mistaken about observation is also less likely in the case of autistic regression. This is because we are talking about parental observation of children and decent parents are highly alert to any signs of illness in a child, particularly a child of the age likely to receive vaccines. I will concede however that it is not impossible for someone to either be mistaken or lie. However it is quite implausible that given the factors weighing against these that all cases are examples of lying or misremembering given the multitude of testimonies that we have.
Thus there is at least some evidence for criteria four on the Bradford-Hill list.
The fifth factor that we can discuss is consistency. In other words, if we introduce aluminium adjuvants to all sorts of different groups, rich, poor, black, white, Asian, male, female, etc, do we see increased levels of autism?
There is a male-female disparity in autism diagnosis, with males being significantly more likely to be diagnosed than females. There is likely some biological reason why boys are more susceptible to this form of aluminium poisoning that is currently unknown (or at least, unknown to me). Nevertheless we see an increase in autism diagnosis in both groups.
The sixth factor we can discuss is experimental evidence. In other words, do we have any hard evidence for aluminium in the brain in autism? The answer to this is yes.
Dr. Exley and his research team examined this question directly. They obtained samples of brain tissue from individuals that had died with a diagnosis of autism. This was the first study of this kind. They examined this brain tissue and found very high levels of aluminium in all samples.
The aluminium content of brain tissue in autism was consistently high. The mean (standard deviation) aluminium content across all 5 individuals for each lobe were 3.82(5.42), 2.30(2.00), 2.79(4.05) and 3.82(5.17) μg/g dry wt. for the occipital, frontal, temporal and parietal lobes respectively. These are some of the highest values for aluminium in human brain tissue yet recorded and one has to question why, for example, the aluminium content of the occipital lobe of a 15 year old boy would be 8.74 (11.59) μg/g dry wt.?
We can add another one of Exley’s papers to make this evidence even better. This paper by Exley and Clarkson contains control samples who died with no signs of neurodegenerative disease:
The aluminium content of each lobe (mean and SD) were 1.03 (1.64), 1.02 (1.27), 0.95 (0.88), 0.77 (0.92) and 0.51 (0.51) μg/g dry wt.
These samples have much lower levels of aluminium in them than the autism samples, and this is despite the fact that the controls were mostly older than the autism samples – meaning lifelong exposure to aluminium through non-vaccine routes would have been higher and it would have had more time to accumulate in the control tissues.
The main limitation of this evidence as pointed out by its critics is that the study had a small sample size of N=5 when it came to measuring aluminium concentration in the autism samples (and for some aspects of the study N=10). This was for practical reasons (i.e. there isn’t a large amount of samples of autistic brain tissue available).
It is fair to acknowledge this, and obviously it would be better if the sample size was larger. However, it is completely dishonest to dismiss this study because of the small sample size. This study, for example, is completely different from a survey where 5 participants answering would be worthless. We are looking at pathological brains with clear evidence of a high level of a neurotoxin in them. The level of neurotoxin in these brains cannot be explained away by saying that there is only a few of them. To have that level of brain aluminium content and for it to not be pathological and negatively affecting the cells around it is absurd, unless you want to straight up deny that aluminium is neurotoxic.
Furthermore, no-one has tried to either confirm or reject the Aluminium Research Group’s findings (to this author’s knowledge at least). The establishment haven’t done a study where they demonstrate that the levels of aluminium found by the group are overly high. This is another case where the establishment claim the evidence isn’t good enough to support an anti-establishment view and then just ignore the question. So, despite establishment criticisms, this is criteria six on our Bradford-Hill list met.
We can use Exley’s evidence to discuss the seventh criteria, biological plausibility.
The 2018 paper shows that the high levels of aluminium were found associated with glia and microglia:
Discrete deposits of aluminium approximately 1 μm in diameter were clearly visible in both round and amoeboid glial cell bodies (e.g. Fig. 3b). Intracellular aluminium was identified in likely neurones and glia-like cells and often in the vicinity of or co-localised with lipofuscin (Fig. 5). Aluminium-selective fluorescence microscopy was successful in identifying aluminium in extracellular and intracellular locations in neurones and non-neuronal cells and across all brain tissues studied (Fig. 1, Fig. 2, Fig. 3, Fig. 4, Fig. 5).
This is important because those cells are disrupted in autism. For example, they are responsible for synaptic pruning, which does not occur correctly in autism.
Aluminium-loaded mononuclear white blood cells, probably lymphocytes, were identified in the meninges and possibly in the process of entering brain tissue from the lymphatic system (Fig. 1).
The eighth criteria we can discuss is specificity. The idea of specificity ideally means that one disease has one cause, but this is difficult to apply to reality as Bradford Hill acknowledged. Aluminium adjuvants, in reality, are highly likely to cause more than one disease. However, the argument is not just that aluminium adjuvants cause autism, but that a specific action of aluminium adjuvants causes autism. Our theory offers a specific toxicant (aluminium), a specific route of exposure (injection), a specific method by which that toxin gets into the brain (macrophages), specific cells that are disrupted (glia and microglia), and specific negative cascades that are triggered (excessive IL-6 production due to an inflammatory response). Our argument also does not claim that glial disruption by aluminium adjuvants causes a whole host of problems, but autism specifically (and nothing else). So the theory meets criteria eight on the list.
The last factor we can discuss is analogy. If we can observe similar things happening that makes our own theory more likely to be true. This is easy to demonstrate in the case of aluminium poisoning, as poisoning by different metals, such as mercury, can cause significant impairments in child functioning. One interesting case worthy of discussion here is that of acrodynia. Acrodynia, or ‘Pink disease’ was an early 20th century disease that symptomatically had some overlap with autism although with some differences. It was later proven that pink disease was a form of mercury poisoning caused by mercury teething powders. We know from this case that metal poisoning can cause symptoms with some similarities to autism. There are also examples of aluminium itself causing other forms of poisoning, which were discussed in point 1. So analogy also supports our case and gives us point 9.
Conclusion
As we can see from the above discussion, the idea that vaccines cause autism is strongly evidenced. However, the theory is also opposed by the entire establishment despite this evidence. It is to how these two differing theories of autism are treated that we now turn.
Smallpox vaccination was said to prevent infection with smallpox. However, there is a significant practical difficulty with this argument, aside from statistical evidence and anecdotes of vaccine failure. This is the nature of ‘vaccine lymph’ itself. Although ‘vaccine lymph’ is often considered to be cowpox, the history is a lot more complicated than this, with multiple different lymph sources in circulation. This poses a theoretical problem for those who argue that vaccination prevented smallpox, since they then have to argue that all these sources are equivalent, but this is unlikely.
Horse Grease Cowpox or Spontaneous Cowpox?
Edward Jenner argued that there was more than one form of cowpox in his essay the Inquiry. His Inquiry starts with a description of a disease of the horse, the grease, which he claims is spread to the cow:
In this Dairy Country a great number of Cows are kept, and the office of milking is performed indiscriminately by Men and Maid Servants. One of the former having been appointed to apply dressings to the heels of a Horse affected with the Grease, and not paying due attention to cleanliness, incautiously bears his part in milking the Cows, with some particles of the infectious matter adhering to his fingers. When this is the case, it commonly happens that a disease is communicated to the Cows, and from the Cows to the Dairy-maids, which spreads through the farm until most of the cattle and domestics feel its unpleasant consequences.
Jenner is clear in this text that the protection comes via the horse, through the cow, to man.
Jenner distinguishes this from spontaneous cowpox, which he considers not protective from smallpox:
It is necessary to observe, that pustulous sores frequently appear spontaneously on the nipples of Cows, and instances have occurred, though very rarely, of the hands of the servants employed in milking being affected with sores in consequence, and even of their feeling an indisposition from absorption. These pustules are of a much milder nature than those which arise from that contagion which constitutes the true Cow Pox. […] But this disease is not be considered as similar in any respect to that of which I am treating, as it is incapable of producing any specific effects on the human Constitution. However, it is of the greatest consequence to point it out here, lest the want of discrimination should occasion an idea of security from the infection of the Small Pox, which might prove delusive.
So here we have two forms of cowpox. One protects from smallpox, and one does not. Presumably, the lymph used by Jenner in his vaccinations outlined in the Inquiry was horse grease cowpox.
So where did his next set of lymph come from? Enter William Woodville.
William Woodville was the lead doctor of the Smallpox Hospital in London and interested in Jenner’s method. He was able to obtain lymph for vaccination from a cow in Grey’s Inn Lane, London. Woodville had been previously unable to directly inoculate horse grease on the cow’s teat.
Be it observed, however, that this London cowpox was not Jenner’s cowpox. It was not horsegrease cowpox, but the variety stigmatised by Jenner as spurious.
However, because Jenner had no source of lymph, the Woodville lymph became the source that was spread across the world, regardless of the fact that it wasn’t horse grease cowpox. So if we take the Jennerian distinction as legitimate, there is a significant argument that the lymph used was not protective. Even if we reject the idea that there is such thing as a horse grease cowpox, there is still the problem of which forms of lesions on a cow’s teat are protective from smallpox, since it is agreed that there is more than one form of disease on the cow’s teat.
Cowpox or Smallpox – Was Woodville’s Lymph Contaminated?
As Woodville worked at the Smallpox Hospital in London, he performed his vaccinations there. This of course meant there was a risk of a patient who may become a vaccinifer contracting smallpox, leading to smallpox being spread along with the vaccine lymph. There were also other issues with how Woodville carried out his tests. Although he ran many more tests than Jenner and was more fastidious in recording his results, in some of his cases he performed the variolous test very early on, while the cowpox pustule was still present:
Ann Pink, a tall girl, of a brown sallow complexion, aged fifteen years. This girl was inoculated with variolous matter, on the fifth day, in the same manner as Collingridge, and both tumours proceeded to maturation, though more slowly than in that case.
He then went on to use some of these cases as vaccinifers (e.g. James Crouch was vaccinated, then inoculated on the 5th day after vaccination, then used as the vaccinifer for case 21). This meant the cowpox matter may well be contaminated with smallpox matter.
As Woodville made differing observations from Jenner, regarding the eruptions on the skin, there were some cases where it seemed evident that Woodville’s patients had smallpox.
Horsepox or Cowpox: Equine Lymph Direct From the Horse
Jenner’s relationship to the horse grease theory of cowpox is not straightforward. Essentially, he advocated it initially, but then failed to mention it in his further essays, likely due to its unpopularity. For example, a notable early vaccine promoter, George Pearson, considered the horse grease part of Jenner’s ideas to be nonsense and openly said so. William White argues that Jenner did this for cynical reasons, i.e. financial gain. Later in his life, however, Jenner essentially returned to the horse and in fact used vaccination (equination?) direct rather than via the cow.
For example, he referred to using equine lymph in his correspondence:
[Mr. Melon] sent me some of his equine virus, which I have been using from arm to arm for these two months past without observing the smallest deviation in the progress and appearance of the pustules from those produced by the vaccine.
It was not just Jenner that use horsepox direct. An Italian vaccinator, Sacco, used horsepox to vaccinate.
Sacco obtained some matter from the ulcerous sores on a horse’s hocks (he gives a startling picture of huge, excavated horse sores in his Trattato of 1809), and therewith inoculated several children at the Foundling Hospital of Milan. He found that the effects were very like those of cowpox virus (as we know, in fact, that they always are) ; and, on trying the children with the variolous test, he found that they were protected just as if they had been cowpoxed.
De Carro in Vienna also used horse grease in his vaccinations.
This horse material likely ended up in wide circulation due to its usage by these prolific vaccinators.
Humanised Lymph: Did Serial Passage Affect the Disease?
As for most of the 19th century, vaccination was arm to arm, there is a possibility that passing through multiple human constitutions may have affected the disease. Essentially, this passing through multiple humans was a crude form of serial passage. In fact, people considered this in the nineteenth century as well, which is why some in the 1840s wanted to “return to the cow” and create a fresh stock of lymph (see below). They believed that the passage through multiple human constitutions had made the disease too mild to be effective against smallpox. As virologists subscribe to the idea of serial passage affecting the function of viruses, then they have to concede this is probable in the case of artificial cowpox infection. Thus the vaccine given over time is not a consistent virus but had different mutations, meaning that there is a distinct possibility of mutation away from being an effective preventative of smallpox even if Jenner’s original concoction worked (which of course, it did not).
Cowpox or Smallpox II: Smallpox Via the Cow
In the 1840s, the idea became prevalent that the lymph was no longer potent and that a stock should be raised from cows. The idea that smallpox and cowpox were the same disease became explicit (Jenner had said that horse grease was ‘the source’ of smallpox instead, although he did call cowpox variolae vaccinae i.e. cow smallpox). The reason that cowpox protected from smallpox on this view was that it was smallpox, except passed via the constitution of the cow which somehow made it milder. This idea wasn’t really explained, just asserted.
Cowpox was not a widespread disease, making it difficult to find new lymph sources. As such, there were those who attempted to deliberately infect cows with smallpox to generate these new lymph sources.
One of these men was Robert Ceely, who performed extensive experiments involving cows. He gave detailed descriptions of cowpox and also infected cows with smallpox and described the results.
Badcock was another 1840s writer, who wanted to obtain fresh lymph for vaccination:
The only satisfactory mode of obtaining, with certainty, the true vaccine that presented itself to my mind was, therefore, to inoculate a healthy cow with Small Pox matter, as the result of that operation, if any, must be cow Small Pox
Badcock used this matter for vaccination and indeed states that he vaccinated ‘several thousand’ with this lymph.
Later in the 19th century, when arm to arm vaccination was abandoned, the method of ‘pure glycerinated calf lymph’ came into vogue and emerged as the main method of vaccination. Again, this involved the deliberate infection of cows with smallpox.
The living calf or heifer is first bound down on a movable tilting table, and its belly is shaved and on the clean, tender skin of a most tender part one or two hundred cuts or scratches are then made, and into these cuts or scratches is rubbed some “seed virus,” obtained directly or indirectly from human smallpox.
Vaccinators also tried different examples of less popular material for vaccination.
One example is sheep pox:
Accordingly, when Sacco, in 1804, obtained variolous lymph from infected sheep at Capua, he gave it to Dr. Legni in the remote Sicilian province of Cattolica to try as a substitute for vaccine in the prevention of smallpox.
There were also other examples of various lymph being used – goat pox was experimented with in Madrid in 1804. Crookshank also argued that cattle plague was used for vaccine lymph in India.
The Jennerian Vesicle: The Vaccination Standard
What connects all of this? The notion of the Jennerian vesicle. Basically, the standard for ‘successful vaccination’ was whether it produced a correct ‘Jennerian vesicle’ on the arm where the matter was inserted. In other words, so long as the vesicle looked ‘correct’ the vaccination was considered to be successful. It goes without saying that this is not a scientific criteria for judging immunity to a disease. But because all these sources could raise the Jennerian vesicle, they were defended as vaccine lymph and some were widely employed.
Conclusion
The fact that so many different diseases, from so many different sources, were considered and used as vaccine lymph, poses a theoretical issue for vaccinationists. All these sources were adjudged at some point, and by some individuals to be appropriate matter for vaccination and many sources existed in circulation. Yet it is difficult theoretically to argue that all these sources were equivalent and thus, for the vaccinationist, equally effective against smallpox.
Cassandra's Box 
