Pox precursors

Anti-vaccine sentiment found fertile soil in the US, where the ethos of individual responsibility often clashed with public health programs based on collective norms. As Allen notes, Americans remained suspicious of calls for mandatory vaccination. What kept vaccine opponents on the defensive, however, were the rapid breakthroughs in medicine and public health. Jenner's triumph was followed by a procession of other vaccines, for rabies, tetanus, yellow fever, diphtheria and more. Allen sees two events in the first half of the twentieth century as crucial to the growing public acceptance of vaccines. When the US went to war in 1941 following Pearl Harbor, the health of the troops became a primary concern. To prevent the medical casualties of the First World War, when the 44,000 US soldiers killed by influenza almost matched the 50,000 killed in battle, military officials made vaccination mandatory. " Yes, the shots hurt and even caused illness sometimes, but the soldiers survived, " Allen writes. The Second World War flagged up vaccination. Combatting polio turned into a national crusade in the US. No disease drew as much attention in the postwar US, or created as much fear. Primarily striking children, polio killed some of its victims and paralysed others, leaving behind vivid reminders for all to see: wheelchairs, leg braces, iron lungs, deformed limbs. The quest for a means of prevention led to the largest public heath experiment in US history, involving nearly two million school-age volunteers. When Jonas Salk's killed polio virus vaccine was declared " safe, effective and potent " in 1955, the nation celebrated. The polio vaccines of Salk and Albert Sabin marked a special moment in medical history. As late as the 1950s, parents had been encouraged to expose their children to diseases like measles, mumps and chicken pox in order to get them over with before adulthood, when the dangers increased. With vaccines for these diseases, some researchers spoke of a future without infectious disease. But in the current age of Aids, avian flu and other infectious diseases, nature appears to remain a full step ahead. For Allen, growing fears of vaccination in the decades after Salk's triumph are partly a function of heightened expectations. But more important, he thinks, was the general fallout from growing general mistrust of authorities in the late twentieth century. In terms of vaccination, the Watergate moment occurred in 1982, he believes, when a television station in …