British physician Edward Jenner (1749-1823) is credited with the invention of the first vaccine to be administered against a contagious disease. Pioneering the concept of vaccines, he studied foreign inoculation and the work of John Fewster c. 1768 that showed prior infections of cowpox helped a patient be immune to smallpox. At the time of Jenner’s work, smallpox was a virulent disease said to kill up to 10% of the world’s population and in some cases significantly more in places with less immunity.
Several other scientists and even a farmer throughout the 1770s and beyond trialed cowpox vaccinations, although the results were not widely published.
In 1796, Jenner inoculated his gardener’s son and then later exposed him to various infections that did not take root in the boy’s system. Jenner would continue his research and publish it to the Royal Society. His successes would spread globally and be used by various others to reduce the further spread of smallpox.
Vaccines would later go through various improvements, but Jenner has been lauded as one of the most influential Britons in history for his accomplishments and impact on immunology.
Read more:
Bennett, M. (2020). War Against Smallpox: Edward Jenner and the Global Spread of Vaccination. (n.p.): Cambridge University Press.
Boddice, R. (2015). Edward Jenner: The Vaccination Visionary. United Kingdom: History Press.
