"When many cures are offered for a disease, it means the disease is not curable" -Anton Chekhov
''Once you tell people there's a cure for something, the more likely they are to pressure doctors to prescribe it.'' -Robert Ehrlich, drug advertising executive.
"Opinions are like sphincters, everyone has one." - Chris Rangel
Physician Uses Children in Smallpox Experiments (in 1767): This essay describes a series of experiments in smallpox inoculation at London's Foundling Hospital in the mid-eighteenth century. The first smallpox inoculation was done in 1722, and by 1765 the practice had reduced mortality from smallpox from 1 in 6 to 1 in 500. This particular experiment wasn't so much about whether or not the inoculation was effective (they already knew it was),as it was about the best method of inoculation. They obviously had no qualms about using the poor foundlings as experimental subjects. Although, to be fair, all of the children in such an institutional setting would surely have been inoculated anyway to prevent an epidemic. posted by Sydney on
4/25/2002 07:47:00 AM
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