Vaccination's Forgotten Origins.

DOI: 10.1542/peds.2016-2833 Accepted for publication Oct 28, 2016 Address correspondence to Patrick J. Pead, MSc, FIBMS, FHA, 34 Barker Close, Fishbourne, Chichester, West Sussex PO18 8BJ UK. E-mail: [email protected] PEDIATRICS (ISSN Numbers: Print, 0031-4005; Online, 10984275). Copyright © 2017 by the American Academy of Pediatrics FINANCIAL DISCLOSURE: Publishing might result in limited sales of the author’s recent book. FUNDING: No external funding. POTENTIAL CONFLICT OF INTEREST: The author has indicated he has no potential confl icts of interest to disclose. The histories of pediatrics and vaccinology are linked, for most primary attempts at vaccinating against smallpox during the 18th century involved children. Today, of course, vaccinations form a universal and essential part of preventative medicine for the very young. Commonly hailed as a “discovery” or a “medical breakthrough, ” the first vaccinations against smallpox with cowpox were really a development from variolation (inoculation with smallpox itself), a technique popularized among the English gentry as “The Inoculation” in the early 1700s by Lady Mary Wortley Montagu. The later introduction of cowpox avoided potential hazards of variolation, which sometimes resulted in death or the transmission of smallpox into areas where it was previously absent.