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An account of the varioloid epidemic which has lately prevailed in Edinburgh and other parts of Scotland : with observations on the identity of chicken-pox with modified small-pox in a letter to Sir James M'Grigor ... / by John Thomson.

  • Thomson, John, 1765-1846.
Date:
1820
Catalogue details

Licence: Public Domain Mark

Credit: An account of the varioloid epidemic which has lately prevailed in Edinburgh and other parts of Scotland : with observations on the identity of chicken-pox with modified small-pox in a letter to Sir James M'Grigor ... / by John Thomson. Source: Wellcome Collection.

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    \ has been, in some degree, shaken by the late very general prevalence of small-pox; and medical practitioners still continue to differ widely in their opinions with regard to the nature and causes of those varioloid diseases, which, in so many different places, have occurred in persons who had undergone the process of vaccination. You are aware, that when I first began to ob- serve the phenomena of the present epidemic, my mind was strongly impressed with the belief, that it originated in the contagion of chicken- pox. Many circumstances contributed at that time to confirm me in this belief. I had long adopted the opinion of Dr. Heberden with re- ' gard to the separate and independent nature of chicken-pox ; and I had also, by personal inter- course with the late Dr. Willan, as well as by the diligent study of his writings, learned to place a. confidence, almost unlimited, in the views which he had taken of the distinctive characters of erup- tive diseases. Besides the varioloid epidemic, which I had occasion to observe at Colinton, Slateford, and Currie, in 1809, I had had fre- quent opportunities, both before and. after that time, of seeing cases which were supposed to be examples of the occurrence of small-pox after vaccination. In several of these, it was impos- sible to deny, that the eruption, in its appear- ance and progress, bore a striking resemblance to small-pox ; yet, notwithstanding this, I had sa- tisfied myself, by a reference to the.writings of