variolation

English

Etymology

variola +‎ -ation

Noun

variolation (countable and uncountable, plural variolations)

1. (historical) The inoculation of a person with smallpox with the intention of inducing a mild form of the illness and subsequent immunity to the disease.

   Variolation is no longer used today. It was replaced by smallpox vaccination, a safer alternative, which in turn led to the development of vaccines against many other diseases.

   • 2005, Eric A. Croddy, James J. Wirtz, editors, Weapons of Mass Destruction, Volume I, ABC-CLIO, page 310:

     To accomplish this, variolation—the use of the smallpox virus—was introduced into military conscription. The practice of variolation that was later routinized in the Qing dynasty was basically a form of vaccination against smallpox.

   • 2008, Jack E. McCallum, Military Medicine, ABC-CLIO, page 339:

     Vaccination refers to inoculation with live Vaccinae variolae (cowpox) virus. Variolation refers to inoculation with live Variolae major (smallpox) virus.
     Both variolation and vaccination are efforts to generate immunity against smallpox. Variolation was employed by practitioners in China and the Middle East for centuries and by farmers and laborers in rural England, where it was referred to as "buying the pox."

   • 2015, C. Michele Thompson, Vietnamese Traditional Medicine, NUS Press, page 83:

     This same French doctor also recorded the progress of the children he had observed for about two weeks after their variolations.¹¹² A French vaccinator remarked that the Vietnamese variolation point on the upper arm corresponded closely to the vaccination point French vaccinators used.

Related terms

• variolate
• variolator

Translations

inoculation with smallpox virus

• French: variolisation (fr) f
• Italian: variolizzazione f, vaiolizzazione f