1971 was the year in which the Surgeon General of the United States Public Health Service, the Redbook Committee of the American Academy of Pediatrics, and the Territorial Health Officers agreed that the time had come to discontinue routine primary smallpox vaccination for American children.I was 20 years old when the recommendation to end routine vaccination came out. I was just looking for data on the number of smallpox vaccinations per year after 1971 and I stumbled on this amazing bit of info.
Mass Smallpox Vaccination and Cardiac Deaths, New York City, 1947
(Yes, 1947!)
Emerging Infectious Diseases (CDC), Volume 10, Number 5—May 2004
Authors: Lorna E. Thorpe*†Comments to Author , Farzad Mostashari*, Adam M. Karpati*1, Steven P. Schwartz*, Susan E. Manning*†, Melissa A. Marx*†, and Thomas R. Frieden*
Author affiliations: *New York City Department of Health and Mental Hygiene, New York, New York, USA; †Centers for Disease Control and Prevention, Atlanta, Georgia, USA
Figure 1. Adult vaccination doses administered and estimated person-time at risk for fatal cardiac adverse effects, New York City, 1947.
Abstract
In April 1947, during a smallpox outbreak in New York City (NYC), >6,000,000 people were vaccinated. To determine whether vaccination increased cardiac death, we reviewed NYC death certificates for comparable periods in 1946 and 1948 (N = 81,529) and calculated adjusted relative death rates for the postvaccination period. No increases in cardiac deaths were observed.