biography
| sex:
| male
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| lived:
| (1749–1823)
|
| biography:
| Physician, the discoverer of the vaccination for smallpox, born in Berkeley, Gloucestershire, SWC England, UK. After an apprenticeship with a local surgeon, he studied under John Hunter in London, then returned to practise in Berkeley (1773), while remaining a firm friend of Hunter. Having observed how an infection of the mild disease cowpox prevented later attacks of smallpox, in 1796 he inoculated a child with cowpox, then two months later with smallpox, and the child failed to develop the disease. His discovery was violently opposed at first, but within five years vaccination was being practised throughout the civilized world. |
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