128 REPORT OF THE LEPROSY COMMISSION:
given rise, in some districts, to such a dread of vaccination
that every device is resorted to by thoughtful parents to prevent
their children from being vaccinated." 47. The history of lep-
rosy of India by no means bears out the assertion that such
"spread or recrudescence of the disease has taken place
during the last thirty years." It will be shown in the follow-
ing lines that, apart from the fact that the above dictum re-
garding "the connexion between the extension of the State-
provided remedy against small-pox and leprosy" involves a
serious petitio principii, a dread of infection through vaccina-
tion does by no means exist in India, and no uneasy feeling
is exhibited on this account and also that there is no reason to
fear a spread of this pest by such means.
It is true that in certain localities hostility to the opera-
tion is met with, but this is due chiefly to the inherent suspi-
cion of an uneducated and ignorant people of any proceeding
of which the reason is not understood, and also among
Hindus to quasi-religious motives. Were this hostility to the
operation based upon observance of its confirmed results in
spreading leprosy or other diseases, the opposition should have
come at some time subsequent to the introduction of the prac-
tice. As a matter of fact, however, it is only at first that
this is observed, and as time wears on, vaccination becomes
more and more readily accepted by the people. In not a
single instance did a leper accuse vaccination as the cause of
his misfortune, although the Commissioners enquired in every
case into the theory a patient might offer for the development
of his disease. As enlightenment and education advance, the
native becomes more and more awake to the benefit conferred
on him and his children by vaccination. Such statements as
those quoted above can only delay the progress of the work
inaugurated by a philanthropic prince by calling up groundless
fears and anxieties in the mind of an uneducated people.
(47) W. Tebb, Leprosy and Vaccination, page 13.