Dissolving Illusions: Disease, Vaccine, and the Forgotten History

The world has always had a love-hate relationship with medicine. On one hand, some people will try any procedure to cure illnesses, but on the other, many are afraid of the doctors. I imagine that when Smallpox inoculation came about, a sizable number of men would’ve said “I’m not dumb enough to go looking to get Cowpox!” Physicians have always been respected in the USA, but the Tuskegee Experiment didn’t endear them to African Americans in the South. A recent book called The Immortal Life of Henrietta Lacks shows how the problem was even worse than it looked.

Humphries and Bystrianyk, a physician and a medical researcher, not only tell the story of the vaccine controversy, but also show that lack of ethics practiced by the doctors. Take the chapter on Smallpox vaccine; the doctors did all of their experiments on children, which today would be totally unacceptable. In some ways, the book makes vaccine look like a reckless-quack-cure-all to deal with the poor. In the chapter The Rebel Experiment, we see how the authorities in Leicester used hygiene as opposed to vaccine. The outbreaks of Smallpox were occurring in the slums, which were crowded, badly-ventilated and filthy. The best way to fight the disease was to move the infected to isolation wards, clean the apartments, and air them out.

The book continues to discuss the problems of “quick fixes” for health problems; DDT, questionable Polio treatments (and diagnosis), along with lack of proper diets. During the Polio epidemic, which often occurred in summer, DDT may have been responsible for damaging immune systems. There’s even a chapter on old remedies, many of which do in fact work. I remember how my grandfather used to make his kids (and grandkids) take cod liver oil every day in the 1950’s. It tasted horrible (even in pill form) but it worked. Cod liver oil contains essential vitamins, and is a known immune-booster.

I get the feeling, after reading this book, that Americans use medicine as a quick fix so they can avoid having to work at it. We give our kids vitamins to compensate because we can’t get them to eat greens. Then we give behaviorally-challenged kids Ritalin to keep them quiet, rather than use sports and outdoor recess. Just like in the 1800’s, when London’s authorities would rather use Cowpox-based vaccine rather than provide clean water, we tend to look for easy cures.