Abstract
THE present outbreak of small-pox in Gloucester is very different from the tragedy of 1895–96. The number of cases in that frightful epidemic was 1981: and the number of deaths was 434. On the present occasion, the number of cases, up to now, has been about one-tenth of that number. As in other places, so in Gloucester, a very mild type of small-pox has appeared: indeed, so mild that, to some people, the very nature of small-pox seems to have changed. Still, the possibility remains that the disease will, some day or other, recover its old virulence. Besides, it appears that some of the Gloucester cases have been serious. Thus, at a meeting of the city council on June 27, the Mayor spoke of “some of the fearful sights” in the wards of the Isolation Hospital, and said that he should never forget them: and the chairman of the Health Committee spoke of “severe and ghastly “cases in the same hospital. Unhappily, so mild were the first cases that they were mistaken for chicken-pox. The best authority on the rules for avoiding this mistake between small-pox and chicken-pox is Dr. Wanklyn: and his writings are worth reading. The mildness of the epidemic, the controversy over its nature, the frequent concealment of cases, and the work of the anti-vaccinationists, have brought about a most unfortunate state of affairs in Gloucester. The fear is that Gloucester is steadily exporting small-pox to neighbouring towns.
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Current Topics and Events. Nature 112, 16–19 (1923). https://doi.org/10.1038/112016a0
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DOI: https://doi.org/10.1038/112016a0