PhD Thesis - ResearchSpace@Auckland - The University of Auckland

not have mandatory immunisation but nor did they have such a strong history of anti-
immunisation sentiment as Britain.
The controversy over the safety of the pertussis vaccine was also the subject of an
article by David and Mark Geier. 22 They argued that there was a direct correlation
between an increasing number of lawsuits which applied to the pertussis vaccine, a
drop in the number of manufacturers who produced it, and the push in the United
States to change to the safer acellular vaccine. The article was predominantly focused
on events in the United States which led to the adoption of the acellular vaccine,
although comparisons are drawn with other countries, especially Britain and the
pertussis controversy that occurred there. However, the article centred on the legal
and political implications; parental responses to the pertussis vaccine in the United
States were not examined in any detail.
In contrast to most historians of individual disease, who have concentrated only on the
local context, historians who have focused specifically on immunisation have adopted
a more comparative perspective. One of the earliest articles employing this technique
was by Jane Lewis which considered diphtheria immunisation in Canada and
Britain. 23 This paper, alongside Evelyn Hammonds’ book on diphtheria in New York
City and Claire Hooker’s article on Australia, was among the few works to consider
both diphtheria and immunisation. Lewis’ comparative analysis of diphtheria
immunisation in Britain and Canada found that using publicity alongside mass school
immunisation campaigns was essential to greatly improving levels of immunisation,
an argument supported by Hammonds. Lewis examined the quite different
experiences of Britain and Canada and argued that in the case of Britain, cautious
attitudes, local authority reluctance to implement immunisation and a lack of funding
meant that a national scheme was implemented much later than in Ontario, Canada
where funding, vaccine and a government-run programme were all in place by the late
1920s. However, Lewis did not explore popular feeling towards immunisation in
Britain which may also have affected uptake. Anti-immunisation movements against
22 D. Geier, M. Geier, ‘The True Story of Pertussis Vaccination: A Sordid Legacy?’ Journal of the
History of Medicine and Allied Sciences, 57, 2002, pp.249-84.
23 J. Lewis, ‘The prevention of diphtheria in Canada and Britain 1914-1945’, Journal of Social History,
20, 1986-87, pp.163-76.
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