Pox_ An American History - Michael Willrich [64]
In his public speeches and writings, Wertenbaker tried to dispel the worst rumors about vaccination: “Rumors of arms, legs, or life lost as the result of vaccination, have, as a rule, no foundation in fact,” he said. But, like Lewis, he developed a real empathy for the predicament of breadwinners. And as he realized how much harm vaccination as it was currently practiced could do, he became an advocate for reform.79
He turned into a strong proponent of “glycerinized lymph,” a newer form of vaccine in which glycerin was used to kill the bacteria that proliferated in vaccine material (which was, after all, an animal virus harvested on the skin of cows). Glycerinized or “glycerinated” vaccine had been in use for several years, but the old, glycerin-free dry points were more widely distributed in the South during the first years of the epidemics. Wertenbaker was not the first public health officer to suggest that it was the dry points—not vaccination in general—that caused so many sore arms in the South. But the issue became a cause for him. He wrote letters to vaccine manufacturers, complaining about impure products. He sent samples of vaccine, including two dry points and two tubes of glycerinized lymph, to the Service’s National Hygienic Laboratory in Washington for testing. Passed Assistant Surgeon Milton J. Rosenau extracted the vaccine material from the samples and heated the material in his laboratory. The tests showed that both of the dry points crawled with bacteria, including virulent Staphylococcus pyogenes aureus, with which Rosenau inoculated a mouse. It died. The samples of glycerinized virus were hardly models of purity. They, too, yielded thousands of colonies of bacteria. But at least these proved nonvirulent.80
Explaining the superiority of the new glycerinized lymph became a regular feature of Wertenbaker’s smallpox lectures. By speaking so candidly about the hazards of the dry point, he won a measure of trust from his audiences. As a regular feature of his performances, he offered to vaccinate volunteers with a tube of glycerinized lymph he carried with him. If all went well, leading citizens would step forward and roll up their sleeves to be scraped before the attentive crowd. On his best days, Wertenbaker told Wyman, “the persons who have been loudest in proclaiming that they will never, never be vaccinated, come up and ask that I vaccinate them at once.” Wertenbaker probably exaggerated when he claimed that, as a result of his talks, “the opposition to vaccination almost entirely disappears” and “the people usually readily acquiesce in any measure directed by the authorities.” But in their own reports local health officials praised his visits, one calling a Wertenbaker performance “of inestimable benefit.” And even when Wertenbaker failed to win over hearts and minds, his talks gave local health officials the leverage they needed to persuade mayors, county supervisors, and judges to appropriate money and take action.81
Wertenbaker always concluded his talks by presenting his plan for wiping out smallpox in the community. In the published version of “The Plan,” which Wertenbaker gave to his official hosts, he noted such details as the appropriate window shades for the smallpox hospital, pondered the relative merits of formaldehyde versus sulfur disinfectants, and specified the daily routines of numerous physicians, guards, and inspectors. (“By 8 a.m., the officer in charge is at his desk. . . .”) He advised (as if such advice were necessary)