The Introduction of Smallpox Vaccine in 1803 and the Adoption of Immunization as a Government Function in Puerto Rico
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Abstract
HE yelling could be heard in the street, two floors down. Young soldiers rushed up the stairs, in order not to miss the action, while other witnesses nearby must have wondered why one physician had not yet thrown the other off the balcony. One hundred sixty thousand persons in Puerto Rico all know about this affair, it has been so public and scandalous.' A king's physician, the royal commissioner, was publicly insulting the city doctor, the man who had brought smallpox vaccination to the island! It had been the Spanish king's intention that the first arrival of vaccine to his American and Asian colonies would be due to a Royal Philanthropic Expedition, directed by the renowned physician and botanist Francisco Xavier de Balmis.2 Nevertheless, the widespread fame of the method, a desperate need for its life-saving effects, its availability in nearby non-Spanish locations, and the resourcefulness of colonists served to anticipate the expedition's task in the Caribbean.
TL;DRIt had been the Spanish king's intention that the first arrival of vaccine to his American and Asian colonies would be due to a Royal Philanthropic Expedition, directed by the renowned physician and botanist Francisco Xavier de Balmis, but the widespread fame of the method, a desperate need for its life-saving effects, its availability in nearby non-Spanish locations, and the resourcefulness of colonists served to anticipate the expedition's task in the Caribbean. (Semantic Scholar)