You would have thought that being opposed to government intervention in 19th century Britain James Wilson would have been against compulsory vaccination. But that was not the case, Jame Wilson, Founder of The Economist Magazine supported compulsory vaccination and did so in public when he was the Financial Secretary to the Treasury in the UK government that introduced the legislation.
In the 1840’s vaccination was optional and more popular was the method of variolation. the method first used to immunize an individual against smallpox(Variola) with material taken from a patient or a recently variolated individual in the hope that a mild, but protective infection would result. The procedure was most commonly carried out by inserting/rubbing powdered smallpox scabs or fluid from pustules into superficial scratches made in the skin. The patient would develop pustules identical to those caused by naturally occurring smallpox, usually producing a less severe disease than naturally acquired smallpox. Eventually, after about two to four weeks, these symptoms would subside, indicating successful recovery and immunity. The method was first used in China and the Middle East before it was introduced into England and North America in the 1720s in the face of some opposition. The method is no longer used today.(1) This method of immunization was to stimulate the immune system to develop protection from a disease because having had a disease almost always offers lifelong protection from the disease.
Vaccines have multiple ingredients in addition to a microorganism or virus in a weakened, killed or live state which may include proteins or toxins from organisms and claim to stimulate the body’s adaptive immunity and to prevent sickness from an infectious disease. According to the CDC, the contemporary smallpox vaccine contains a live virus, not a killed or weakened virus like many other vaccines. However it is not a smallpox virus it is vaccinia.
The difference between these two methods of immunization is in the stimulation of the immune system. Variolation allows stimulation of the immune system and allows it to work to fight off invasive bacteria that your body doesn’t want. Vaccination bypasses the immune system by the delivery of the vaccine directly into the body/bloodstream via injection. The immune system is not stimulated and develops no resistance to the invaders but the vaccine (virus and toxins) is delivered into the body directly and immediately.
During the World Health Organization’s Smallpox Eradication Campaign vaccination teams came across variolators in remote areas of Pakistan and Afghanistan and their samples were confiscated. Although variolation has ceased, it has influenced the concept of other traditional practices, such as “Pox Parties” in which children are intentionally exposed to diseases like chickenpox and measles and rubella in an attempt to gain immunity. Although strongly discouraged by public health officials, the practice persists. (2)
Despite the genocidal famine imposed on them by parliament at London in the 1840’s, the Irish had defeated the British in The Fenian Rebellion in 1867. The young men, who may have numbered up to 8,000 were Fenians – members of the Irish Republican Brotherhood and this was the day of a long-planned-for insurrection aimed at toppling British rule and establishing an Irish Republic. (3) This rebellion was attributed to what they dubbed the “Curse of the Monarchical Government”.
By 1867 the extension of compulsory vaccination to Ireland and the sudden fall in the number of deaths from smallpox there was cited in the pages of The Economist as evidence that the policy was working. In 1867, the least amount of deaths were caused by smallpox. (4) There were only 21 deaths from small pox in 1867 and each year the number did not significantly increase. In 1874, there were only 24 deaths from small pox. The Economist writes: “By 1867, the extension of compulsory vaccination to Ireland and the sudden fall in the number of deaths from smallpox there was cited in the pages of The Economist as evidence that the policy was working.” However, the large amount of deaths in Ireland before 1867 were caused by the famine that caused sickness and disease. Not only was the famine a factor, emigration had decreased the population too. There were approximately 750,000 less people in Ireland as per the 1861 census when compared to the 1851 census. If they weren’t killed by the famine, they emigrated. Furthermore, the birth rate was down due to these factors. There were 70,000 less children born in 1851 than in 1841 as per the census data. Clearly the facts enhanced the promotion of compulsory vaccination but compulsory vaccination had nothing to do with the number of small pox deaths by 1867. There was no sudden fall in the number of deaths from small pox. Historical sources suggest that in the 1800s, when smallpox still posed a serious threat, the Micmac native Americans of Nova Scotia treated the disease using a botanical infusion derived from the insectivorous plant Sarracenia purpurea, a species of pitcher plant.
The Economist further states that “Wilson supported the legislation because, in spite of his uncompromising free-trade views, he still retained a reverence for facts and figures.” The facts and figures had nothing do with his stance on compulsory vaccination, they were just conveniently spun to support the agenda of the day. He was a self-taught economist not a scientist or medical doctor and one of the reasons that he may have supported compulsory vaccination was simply a personal one.
The Economist also writes “Worries about a supposed link between the measles-mumps-rubella (or MMR) vaccine and autism have been utterly discredited.” According to Merck, the drug manufacturer of the MMR vaccine the ingredients are as follows:
Active Ingredients: weakened forms of the measles, mumps, and rubella viruses. Inactive Ingredients: sorbitol, sodium phosphate, potassium phosphate, sucrose, sodium chloride, hydrolyzed gelatin, recombinant human albumin, fetal bovine serum, other buffer and media ingredients, neomycin
According to a new study, a concentration of heavy metals in a child’s body can cause autism. If you examine sodium phosphate for example, one of the ingredients listed above, and read the government study as to what it does here, you can decide for yourself if it is an ingredient that should be in the body. According to the study, it acts as a chelating agent to bind to metallic and alkaline ions to alter the properties and stability of foods/meat/muscle, it binds muscle/flesh to enhance sensory characteristics, it binds and sequesters metals. An example of this is the binding of copper and ferrous ions to slow down the lipid oxidation in foods. Multiple vaccinations in humans lead to metal composition. What does this mean as a human being, obviously you are not a can of spam on a shelf. There have been few studies relating to this subject, but this study suggests that lipid oxidation in humans leads to liver disease. As it so happens, there is a study linking gastrointestinal (including the liver) disorders and autism in children.
I was just going to examine one ingredient of the MMR vaccine but Fetal Bovine Serum is just too provocative to ignore. Fetal bovine serum (FBS) comes from the blood drawn from a bovine fetus via a closed system of collection at the slaughterhouse. The World Organization for Animal Health and the American Veterinary Medical Association have cited scientific evidence showing that the fetus does not suffer when the cow is slaughtered, as long as the fetus remains inside the uterus for 15–20 minutes, the time it takes for the fetus to die. Animal welfare is discussed and the human welfare of ingestion of such animal product is not. This article doesn’t mention anything about the state of the fetus, the serum collected and it’s destination. According to the late Dr. Norman Walker who lived to the ripe age of 99, the cow (mother and/or fetus) becomes highly aware of the forthcoming execution and panics shooting adrenaline throughout her entire body involuntarily. The adrenaline becomes toxic in the cow meat. Dr. Walker believed that toxic meat caused cancer in humans and as a result he made the personal choice not to eat meat. Is science biased? Are there doctors who are quacks? Yes and yes, so you can take this information with a grain of salt. It could be really far-fetched to think that a possibly toxic fetal bovine serum could be infected with mad cow disease as is suggested here. If none of these studies suit you, then you can blame your gene pool for autism with this one. However, there are some that suggest vaccines mutate genetic coding which would nullify your gene pool giving you autism.
Was compulsory vaccination practically and morally justifiable to James Wilson as The Economist suggests? No. This was an emotional subject to a very logical and calm James Wilson. How could mandatory vaccination be practical and morally justifiable to anybody? James Wilson was an economist and a politician and although there are many scientists in the Wilson family, he was not one of them.
William Wilson, Inventor of Tweed, the legendary fabric and Father to fifteen children, one of which was James Wilson, had lost his wife giving birth to James’ Brother; George of Kilmeny: the Father of Sir James Glenny Wilson, M.P. New Zealand.
William Wilson & Sons was the first firm in Hawick to use steam power, Melrose’s supplying the engine in 1831. In 1787, the Duke of Buccleuch had granted ground and water for William’s Mill at Slitrig Crescent. Around 1832 the firm moved to manufacturing woollen belts that were said to be a preventative for cholera as was removing impurities from slaughter houses quickly.
Of his Father, William Wilson, his son wrote:
“In consequence of the prevalence of cholera, and the advice of Medical men that woolen belts, now known as Cholera belts, were a preventative, a great demand for these set in and employed all the frames, so that the stocking market was relieved, and before te end of 1833, I have heard my father say that their stock was entirely exhausted.
It was this experience, and his life long sympathy with his workers, that, no doubt, often induced him to make for stock, when it would have been wiser to have stopped production.”
– Charles John Wilson
Looks like everyone in Scotland was named Wilson. This Wilson in the ad above is not a relative though could be a clan member.
Russian-Jewish bacteriologist Waldemar Haffkine developed the first cholera vaccine in July 1892. One of the major contributions to fighting cholera was made by the physician and pioneer medical scientist John Snow (1813–1858), who in 1854 found a link between cholera and contaminated drinking water which is so strange since Hawick’s water supply is naturally pure with no additives unless the water sewage treatment plant delivers the water. However, simply boiling water before drinking it kills cholera according to Dr. Eric Mintz of the CDC.
Putting aside the whole flouride issue and toxins from pipes, not too many people realize what a water sewage treatment plant does. It turns sewage back into drinking water through filtration and then redistributes it to the public. The only way around it is to have your own well or your own water supply. Prior to 1945, there were 210 separate organisations involved in drinking water supply in Scotland,but no mandatory requirement for such provision. This changed in 1946, when local authorities were required to provide a water supply to their communities. The first major rationalisation of the system took place as a result of the Water (Scotland) Act 1967, which created 13 Regional Water Boards, drawing together all the smaller suppliers.(6)
There was a huge outbreak of the cholera epidemic in Hawick and William Wilson was arguably the most prominent local to die from cholera in 1832. The hosier and wool manufacturer succumbed when attending the annual Quakers’ Society meeting in London with his daughter Katherine. He left equal shares of his fortune to his 5 grown-up sons and five daughters out of fifteen originally. The letter from William to his children a few days before he passed titled “Dear Bairns” was given to Cynthia Aubrey Wilson of Hawick by Basil Aubrey Wilson of Hawick, and is for private circulation only.
According to a Hawick blogger, James Halliburton and his son Thomas, who became infected through close contact with the victim. The pair were treated by Dr. Douglas with what we now know as the highly poisonous Mercury Chloride – given in bottle form as ‘Calomel’. Amazingly, these two men became the first two survivors of Cholera in the town! Usually a stiff drink or a hot toddy is the medicine of Hawick. Mercury Chloride kills worms. Perhaps there were parasites in the drinking water which caused Cholera. I doubt that there were many obsessive compulsive hand washers at that time.
With great hope, optimism and idealism as always towards his family and the world James Wilson supported compulsory vaccination on a purely biased and emotional basis due to the loss of his father to cholera. The real reason that “Laissez-faire” James Wilson supported compulsory vaccination which seems completely contrary to his strident support for individual liberty simply was that James loved his father. He made an exception. He supported government intervention to prevent cholera and vaccines which seemed like a “high-tech” solution at the time. As previously pointed out, facts, figures and science were flawed but made a rational intellectual argument. The sad irony is that cholera is a diarrheal illness caused by an infection of the intestine by the Vibrio cholerae bacterium and James Wilson later died of a diarrheal illness; dysentary probably caused by Indian Cholera. The very thing that killed James’ father and that he felt passionately about erradicating, got James too.
1. https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Variolation
2. Young, Leslie (2010). The Everything Parent’s Guide to Vaccines: Balanced, Professional Advice to Help You Make the Best Decision for Your Child. Adams Media. ISBN 978-1605503660.
3. http://www.theirishstory.com/2011/03/05/today-in-irish-history-%E2%80%93the-fenian-rebellion-march-5-1867/
4. https://www.cso.ie/en/media/csoie/releasespublications/documents/birthsdm/archivedreports/P-VS_1877.pdf
5. https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Water_supply_and_sanitation_in_Scotland
6. https://www.chemistryworld.com/news/rediscovered-native-american-remedy-kills-poxvirus/3003420.article