Late great engineers: Edward Jenner

Towards the end of the 18th century an English doctor by the name of Edward Jenner conducted an experiment on an eight-year-old boy that was to change the world. The experiment had its critics. The clergy said that Jenner’s work was repulsive and ungodly, while satirical cartoons appeared showing humans sprouting cows’ heads. But the advantages of using cowpox pus to inoculate against smallpox – the deadliest disease in human history – soon became clear, and Jenner’s pioneering work in the field became the rock upon which the fight against smallpox and other infectious human diseases was built. While Jenner wasn’t alone in realising that inoculation with cowpox provided immunity to smallpox, he was the first to publish proof of its efficacy and to develop a reliable vaccine. Today, the physician from Berkeley in Gloucester is known throughout the world as the father of immunology. Napoleon called Jenner “one of the greatest benefactors of mankind.”