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Does anyone on here remember the smallpox vaccine


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Old 22-12-2016, 14:14
duckylucky
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My own grandmother (my mums mother) died of diphtheria in 1933;...pretty awful way to die evidently,….the good ol’days eh.
So sad , there were some awful diseases then and mortality so high
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Old 22-12-2016, 14:28
Dix
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Anyone on here remember getting the smallpox vaccine. Did people really buy cages to cover the site as it was so painful.
I remember once seeing a cage over a patient's leg, or lower body, then the bed covers were placed on that. If you needed to cover the vaccinated area you could place a small cover over it, to protect it from harm, for instance, or until the skin was healed. Don't know if it's done these days though.
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Old 22-12-2016, 14:32
bri160356
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The Polio jab was the big one when I was a kid

It left a scar on your arm which I thought lasted forever but I've just checked and I can't see it now..

I think we had a lot less jabs in the 1950s but the needles were thicker so they hurt a lot more.............
….especially when they’d throw the needle at your arm from the other side of the room;...the bastards.
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Old 22-12-2016, 14:43
bspace
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I know I had it because my mother said so but I can't remember it and there's no scar. I do remember the polio sugar cube but probably because we'd been fed horror stories about the injection and got the cube instead.

Interestingly while googling when the small pox injection was fazed out I came across this which I hadn't heard of before "Withdrawal of smallpox vaccine 'contributed to spread of HIV'".
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Old 22-12-2016, 14:54
Dix
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The Polio jab was the big one when I was a kid

It left a scar on your arm which I thought lasted forever but I've just checked and I can't see it now..

I think we had a lot less jabs in the 1950s but the needles were thicker so they hurt a lot more.............
Aged 5 and you're not looking at needles, you scream your head off instead as it sinks into your skin. Still remember the time, seeing the doctors in their whites, kids in rows waiting their turn. It was painful no matter what she said, but once out you could breathe again, but having to return for more was gruesome. -shudder-
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Old 22-12-2016, 14:59
silversox
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I've just remembered! I have a circular scar just under my left boob. Back in 1947 our doctor thought it would be a good idea to vaccinate girls in that place so that it wouldn't show as they matured! Hey ho, she was right!

When my Dad was posted to Cyprus back in the fifties we all had to have a TABT inoculation. I think it stood for Typhoid Anti Bacteria and Tetanus. OMG, I can still feel the pain now! It was horrendous!
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Old 22-12-2016, 15:31
bri160356
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Aged 5 and you're not looking at needles, you scream your head off instead as it sinks into your skin. Still remember the time, seeing the doctors in their whites, kids in rows waiting their turn. It was painful no matter what she said, but once out you could breathe again, but having to return for more was gruesome. -shudder-
However horrible the vaccinations were they were nothing compared to the diseases they prevented.

When I was a kid there was a young girl who lived across the road from me who’d survived Polio (infantile paralysis) but she was terribly deformed and could just about manage to move around very slowly (and painfully) on crutches.

It was a horrible, cruel and often fatal disease;….little wonder pre 1960’s parents were absolutely terrified of it.

A few ‘needle injections’ and most of us have been spared all manner of hideous diseases that were commonplace not that many years ago;

…nothing short of miraculous really.
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Old 22-12-2016, 15:33
Dix
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I've just remembered! I have a circular scar just under my left boob. Back in 1947 our doctor thought it would be a good idea to vaccinate girls in that place so that it wouldn't show as they matured! Hey ho, she was right!

When my Dad was posted to Cyprus back in the fifties we all had to have a TABT inoculation. I think it stood for Typhoid Anti Bacteria and Tetanus. OMG, I can still feel the pain now! It was horrendous!


Under the heading of Typhoid, Paratyphoid, A&B Inoculations, I had 1st dose and 2nd dose,9 days apart, but no booster, in 1951.

Sorry for hijacking the Thread, but have never studied this booklet that much before. Under the heading of Diphtheria, BCG, Whooping Cough and other Immunisations. the doc was busy for 4 days in July of 1950, and 1 day each of Feb and March, same year of Di 5g. Hope the UNHCR paid her well
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Old 22-12-2016, 15:53
SaturnV
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Some confusion on here, not surprising as we were only kids at the time.
I thought it was big needle on the upper arm for TB, drop on a sugarlump for polio and a prick test for smallpox. No lump then you get the injection.
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Old 22-12-2016, 15:54
WinterLily
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Anyone on here remember getting the smallpox vaccine. Did people really buy cages to cover the site as it was so painful.
I had the smallpox vaccine as a child.

Never heard about cages Cages?
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Old 22-12-2016, 16:02
Dix
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However horrible the vaccinations were they were nothing compared to the diseases they prevented.

When I was a kid there was a young girl who lived across the road from me who’d survived Polio (infantile paralysis) but she was terribly deformed and could just about manage to move around very slowly (and painfully) on crutches.

It was a horrible, cruel and often fatal disease;….little wonder pre 1960’s parents were absolutely terrified of it.

A few ‘needle injections’ and most of us have been spared all manner of hideous diseases that were commonplace not that many years ago;

…nothing short of miraculous really.
But at age 5 you don't know, and only feel the pain of the needle, and being scared of it. I didn't know I was born with a handicap until I was an adult, and no one ever knew I had it. It was discovered by chance during an exploratory op, when they found it via my DNA in London. It did explain my early years development, but I was lucky in many respects re education, and it hasn't held me back because of that.

My old boss had Polio in one of his hands, but he had learned to do things one handedly, and we also helped him when he needed help, so I'm not ignorant re diseases, and deformities in others, and have a lot of compassion for people, and do what I can for them.
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Old 22-12-2016, 16:03
swingaleg
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Some confusion on here, not surprising as we were only kids at the time.
I thought it was big needle on the upper arm for TB, drop on a sugarlump for polio and a prick test for smallpox. No lump then you get the injection.
I guess it depends on when you had them

according to wiki the oral 'vaccine' for polio wasn't developed until 1961 so us old folk who had it in the 1950s would have had a jab
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Old 22-12-2016, 16:03
bri160356
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Some confusion on here, not surprising as we were only kids at the time.
I thought it was big needle on the upper arm for TB, drop on a sugarlump for polio and a prick test for smallpox. No lump then you get the injection.
I’m reasonably (??) sure I can remember which injection was which but I wouldn’t put money on it;

….the various combinations, real or imagined, are probably endless.
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Old 22-12-2016, 16:09
Dix
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I had the smallpox vaccine as a child.

Never heard about cages Cages?
They're called Dressing Cages, as I looked it up. They're frames placed over a person who has maybe injured legs, or body, so that the bedding doesn't press down onto them. When bedding is pulled back, the nurse can check how the injured part is through the frame, and attend to the patient. I saw a nurse do that once.
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Old 22-12-2016, 16:11
LakieLady
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I remember having all sorts of injections when I was a kid;…our little upper arms were like dart boards ;…. Smallpox, Diphtheria, Tetanus, Pertussis, Measles, Mumps, Rubella and TB;..I think the Polio vaccine was taken in liquid form ???,… was that the one you got on a sugar lump?
Pertussis, measles, mumps and rubella weren't given in my childhood (born in 1955), they came later. I had measles in 1958, rubella in 1961 and mumps in 1966. I don't recall being particularly ill with any ofthem.

When I was a kid, polio vaccine was given by injection but it was given on a sugar lump when my brother was born 10 years later.
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Old 22-12-2016, 16:14
bri160356
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But at age 5 you don't know, and only feel the pain of the needle, and being scared of it. I didn't know I was born with a handicap until I was an adult, and no one ever knew I had it. It was discovered by chance during an exploratory op, when they found it via my DNA in London. It did explain my early years development, but I was lucky in many respects re education, and it hasn't held me back because of that.

My old boss had Polio in one of his hands, but he had learned to do things one handedly, and we also helped him when he needed help, so I'm not ignorant re diseases, and deformities in others, and have a lot of compassion for people, and do what I can for them.
To be honest I was always more scared of our headmistress, Mrs Thornton.

The vaccinations were always done in her office and she’d personally supervise every one.

Any child who cried got a rap on the knuckles with her ever present wooden-ruler;

….I think she learned her trade in a Victorian workhouse.
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Old 22-12-2016, 16:20
LakieLady
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Think I'm too young for the smallpox, thought that was around in the middle ages.

I assume from the thread the ubiquitous scar left on our arms is for Polio or TB, I do remember getting a sugar lump at some point.
I think you're getting smallpox mixed up with the Black Death.

I thought that smallpox vax was still done until the late 60s, maybe even very early 70s. I'm sure my brother had a smallpox shot.

The left arm scar is usually from smallpox. Polio shots didn't tend to leave scars.
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Old 22-12-2016, 16:22
SaturnV
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I guess it depends on when you had them

according to wiki the oral 'vaccine' for polio wasn't developed until 1961 so us old folk who had it in the 1950s would have had a jab
That would explain it, mine would have been about 1965
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Old 22-12-2016, 16:24
Dix
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However horrible the vaccinations were they were nothing compared to the diseases they prevented.

When I was a kid there was a young girl who lived across the road from me who’d survived Polio (infantile paralysis) but she was terribly deformed and could just about manage to move around very slowly (and painfully) on crutches.

It was a horrible, cruel and often fatal disease;….little wonder pre 1960’s parents were absolutely terrified of it.

A few ‘needle injections’ and most of us have been spared all manner of hideous diseases that were commonplace not that many years ago;

…nothing short of miraculous really.
I'm sure pre-60s parents must have been scared re health of their child, but can't speak re that, as my experience has nothing to do with parents per se. My Vaccinations came from another source, who vaccinated all the kids in their care, and even if the Vacs helped, it didn't mean the kids became whole, as many wouldn't have been.


That's all I wanted to say, ok
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Old 22-12-2016, 16:28
Gordon g
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With every vaccine at our school, the rumors were usually that the needle was 15ft long I remember one with 6 needles that was rumored to be administered with an electric drill.
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Old 22-12-2016, 16:33
LakieLady
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With every vaccine at our school, the rumors were usually that the needle was 15ft long I remember one with 6 needles that was rumored to be administered with an electric drill.

Lol.

The rumour at my school was about the BCG test: that allegedly involved being punctured with 6 needles simultaneously, and if you were one of the unlucky ones that reacted and had to have a TB vax, that was supposed to be even worse.

Thankfully, I was off school with tonsillitis when the tests were done, so I never had one.
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Old 22-12-2016, 16:43
Dix
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To be honest I was always more scared of our headmistress, Mrs Thornton.

The vaccinations were always done in her office and she’d personally supervise every one.

Any child who cried got a rap on the knuckles with her ever present wooden-ruler;

….I think she learned her trade in a Victorian workhouse.
I had teachers like that too, and shied away from them until I got brave to face one of them, but that teacher beat me back with a look and words. But when that mouse ran across the floor, that fixed her good and proper, she became a quivering mass, hunched up on that stool, squealing her head off at the poor mouse. Losing one's dignity over a mouse isn't the way to do things in a class of girls Respect goes out the window.

Maybe your Mrs T could do with a mouse or two
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Old 22-12-2016, 16:47
bri160356
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With every vaccine at our school, the rumors were usually that the needle was 15ft long I remember one with 6 needles that was rumored to be administered with an electric drill.
…is this the needle (or needles!) you mean;….it was used for TB jabs years ago.

No wonder we were scarred (and scared!) for life.
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Old 22-12-2016, 16:50
Union Jock
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Anyone on here remember getting the smallpox vaccine. Did people really buy cages to cover the site as it was so painful.
Cages? I was given a sweet and a pat on the head.
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Old 22-12-2016, 16:58
Dix
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I think you're getting smallpox mixed up with the Black Death.

I thought that smallpox vax was still done until the late 60s, maybe even very early 70s. I'm sure my brother had a smallpox shot.

The left arm scar is usually from smallpox. Polio shots didn't tend to leave scars.
Re the Black Death, heard some time ago that it could return.
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