22 Angels

[carlos]

Last Monday we watched the hystorical Spanish movie "22 ángeles" which narrates a fascinating feat that has been almost completely ignored by history textbooks.

 

By the end of the 17th century and beginning of the 18th more than half of the population worldwide was sick with smallpox. Millions died and many who survived remained blind and disfigured.

 

In 1796 the English physician Edward Jenner developed a vaccine based on cowpox that proved very effective. The problem was how to take that vaccine overseas. The voyage to America by ship took six weeks, and there were no electricity nor fridges at the time. In 1803 a Spanish doctor, Francisco Javier Balmis, had a brilliant idea: to use human carriers. He contacted Isabel de Zendal, who ran an orphanage, and twenty two healthy children were selected for an expedition financed by the Spanish crown. A couple of them were inoculated with the vaccine before parting. When they developed pustules after several days, fluid from those was taken and inoculated in other two children. And so with all the children until they arrived in Puerto Rico, then Cuba, Mexico, Venezuela, Ecuador, Peru, and all the the other Spanish colonies in America. Hundreds of thousands were vaccinated in those countries.

 

Afterwards, doctor Balmis and Isabel de Zendal selected a new group of children and used the same method to bring the vaccine to Philippines, then China, and on their way back to Spain, the Saint Helena island.

 

Thanks to the efforts of Balmis and Zendal, an important percentage of the world's population was immunized against smallpox and many millions of lives were saved. By the way, two of the children died during the voyage, and the rest were adopted by families in Mexico.

 

Once the smallpox vaccine was spread worldwide, other campaigns followed. WHO's worldwide eradication program from 1966 to 1980 succeeded to completely eradicate smallpox from in all the world. The last victim of smallpox died in 1978.

 

[Alexa]

Thank you brother Carlos  

[Pjdriver]

11 hours ago, carlos said:

Last Monday we watched the hystorical Spanish movie "22 ángeles" which narrates a fascinating feat that has been almost completely ignored by history textbooks.

 

By the end of the 17th century and beginning of the 18th more than half of the population worldwide was sick with smallpox. Millions died and many who survived remained blind and disfigured.

 

In 1796 the English physician Edward Jenner developed a vaccine based on cowpox that proved very effective. The problem was how to take that vaccine overseas. The voyage to America by ship took six weeks, and there were no electricity nor fridges at the time. In 1803 a Spanish doctor, Francisco Javier Balmis, had a brilliant idea: to use human carriers. He contacted Isabel de Zendal, who ran an orphanage, and twenty two healthy children were selected for an expedition financed by the Spanish crown. A couple of them were inoculated with the vaccine before parting. When they developed pustules after several days, fluid from those was taken and inoculated in other two children. And so with all the children until they arrived in Puerto Rico, then Cuba, Mexico, Venezuela, Ecuador, Peru, and all the the other Spanish colonies in America. Hundreds of thousands were vaccinated in those countries.

 

Afterwards, doctor Balmis and Isabel de Zendal selected a new group of children and used the same method to bring the vaccine to Philippines, then China, and on their way back to Spain, the Saint Helena island.

 

Thanks to the efforts of Balmis and Zendal, an important percentage of the world's population was immunized against smallpox and many millions of lives were saved. By the way, two of the children died during the voyage, and the rest were adopted by families in Mexico.

 

Once the smallpox vaccine was spread worldwide, other campaigns followed. WHO's worldwide eradication program from 1966 to 1980 succeeded to completely eradicate smallpox from in all the world. The last victim of smallpox died in 1978.

 

Great story Carlos. Is there a book or just an article to read the whole story?

[carlos]

On 14/12/2016 at 10:51 PM, Pjdriver said:

Great story Carlos. Is there a book or just an article to read the whole story?

It's based on a book but I don't think it's translated into English. 

 

However, there's an article in Wikipedia about the expedition. 

[retroHelen]

Here's another heroic vaccine story. We went to New York and walked around Central Park and came upon a large bronze sculpture of magnificent looking Husky Sled Dog called Balto. When we got home I looked up about him and what he did: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Balto  My husband has since used him as an illustration in a talk he did about endurance.