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Contribution Of Two Women Travelers To The History Of Smallpox Vaccination
Effie POULAKOU-REBELAKOU*
* Department of the History of Medicine, Athens National University, GREECE
Women travelers during the 18th and 19th centuries were a rare phenomenon, explained by social, economical and educational reasons. Two of them, having the double role of a traveler and a mother, described their experiences in Turkey and Greece respectively, including the experimental or the official vaccination for their own children.The first writer. Lady Mary Wortley Montagu, wife of the British ambassador to the Sublime Porte, as the Ottoman government was called, traveled to Istanbul in 1716. She was herself a victim of smallpox and had a great interest about the disease. In her series of letters under the title "Travels in Europe, Asia and Africa", she gave a plain account of the inoculating of the smallpox by a Turkish merchant, supporting the effectiveness and the value of the vaccination. She is remembered for introducing inoculation against smallpox into England, performing this experimental method at her own children, first at her son in Istanbul and then at her daughter in London with eyewitnesses the members of the Royal FamilyThe second writer. Christianne Lüth from Denmark, wife of the personal priest of the first Queen of Greece, Amalia, followed her husband in Athens, shortly after the establishment of the Neohellenic Nation She kept a diary of all these years (1839-1852) and wrote letters and travel impressions from every visited place, describing the events occurring in her environment, like the vaccination of her children by the physician of the Royal Court in 1842, after a smallpox epidemic.Conclusion: non-medical sources often provide precious details about the history, invention and apply of vaccinations giving another aspect of the human dimensions.Keywords: Çiçek aşısı, Kadın gezginler, BuluşlarTurkiye Klinikleri J Med Ethics 2003, 11:4-7
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