New Delhi: As World Immunization Week is about to start in less than a day, Google India has shared one of the earliest vaccination certificates ever. The certificate depicts English doctor Edward Jenner inoculating a boy with cowpox on his upper arm, mothers holding out their children to the patron goddess Hygieia, and saying, "Figure, health, and protected life." In Greek religion, Hygieia is the goddess of health.
Google shared the vaccination certificate on Twitter on Sunday, April 24.
Can you guess which disease the vaccine offered protection against?
The answer is: smallpox. The origin of the disease is unknown. Smallpox-like rashes were found on Egyptian mummies, which suggests that smallpox has existed for at least 3,000 years.
All About Smallpox And The History Of Vaccination
Smallpox was a serious infectious disease caused by the variola virus. It was contagious, and caused symptoms such as fever, and a distinctive, progressive skin rash.
Smallpox was a terrible disease because on average, three out of every 10 people who contracted it died, according to the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention (CDC). Those who survived were left with permanent scars.
Variolation was one of the first methods for controlling smallpox, named after variola virus. During this process, people who had never contracted smallpox were exposed to material from smallpox sores called pustules by scratching the material into their arm or inhaling it through the nose. Though people usually developed the symptoms associated with smallpox after variolation, fewer people died as a result of this process, compared to the number of deaths that would have occurred if smallpox was acquired naturally.
In the year 1796, the basis for vaccination began. Edward Jenner noticed that milkmaids who had gotten cowpox were protected from smallpox, and also knew about variolation. He guessed that exposure to cowpox could be used to provide protection against smallpox.
In order to test his theory, Jenner took material from a cowpox sore on milkmaid Sarah Nelmes' hand and inoculated it into the arm of James Phipps, the nine-year-old son of Jenner's gardener.
Jenner exposed Phipps several times to variola virus, months after he inoculated the material from the cowpox sore into the child's arm. Surprisingly, Phipps never developed smallpox.
Jenner conducted more experiments, and in 1801, he published his treatise "On the Origin of the Vaccine Inoculation." Jenner summarised his discoveries in his treatise, expressing hope that the "annihilation of the smallpox, the most dreadful scourge of the human species, must be the final result of this practice."
Gradually, vaccination became widely accepted, and replaced the practice of variolation. In the 1800s, the virus used to make smallpox vaccines changed from cowpox to vaccinia virus, according to the CDC.
One of the first countries to introduce compulsory vaccination according to Jenner's method was the Kingdom of Bavaria. On August 26, 1807, the Royal Bavarian Government Gazette published a decree "concerning smallpox vaccination to be introduced by law in all provinces."
King Max I Joseph of the Kingdom of Bavaria ordered that all persons above the age of three who never contracted smallpox must be vaccinated by July 1, 1808. He did this in order to extend the protection achieved and to contain the spread of smallpox in the kingdom. As proof, vaccination certificates were issued after successful vaccination against smallpox.
The doctors documented the successful vaccination against "smallpox" with vaccination certificates, which were usually simple slips of paper. The only exception was a certificate issued in Graz, Styria, in 1855, which depicts Jenner, milkmaids, children, and a cow. The same vaccination certificate was shared by Google.
The vaccination set for smallpox was made in Tuttlingen, Germany, and was manufactured between 1920 and 1930. It consisted of a knife, which was sterilised before being dipped into the vaccine. Then, the vaccine was inoculated into the upper arm of a person with two small cuts.
A few days after the vaccination, a small pustule was formed on the upper arm, which scarred characteristically, indicating that the vaccination was successful.
Due to the success of vaccination, smallpox was eradicated, and no cases of naturally occurring smallpox have occurred since 1977.
On May 8, 1980, the 33rd World Health Assembly, the decision-making body of the World Health Organization, declared the world free of smallpox. This was almost two centuries after Jenner hoped that vaccination could annihilate smallpox.
Jenner is also known as the "father of immunology". His work is said to have "saved more lives than the work of any other human".