Definition. A vaccine is defined as a standardized suspension of dead bacteria in a physiological salt solution preserve in Lysol or Carbolic acid, which is administered for the purpose of raising th opsonic index of patients suffering from an infection by these organisms. When the preservatives are used, they are used in amounts which would approximate the 3x homoeopathic dilution in both cases. Not all vaccines are preserved by these substances. In the case of autogenous vaccines they are largely prepared and preserved with alcohol. Nosodes are defined as remedies taken from diseases and prepared homoeopathically. Varieties. Vaccines are divided into : I. Stock; 2. Autogenous, and 3. Mixed. A stock vaccine is made from the culture of pathogenic organisms and may be used on any patient. An autogenous vaccine is made from cultures taken from the patient himself, and can be used in his cplace it among proved medical facts.
+ Definition. A vaccine is defined as a standardized suspension of dead bacteria in a physiological salt solution preserve in Lysol or Carbolic acid, which is administered for the purpose of raising th opsonic index of patients suffering from an infection by these organisms. When the preservatives are used, they are used in amounts which would approximate the 3x homoeopathic dilution in both cases. Not all vaccines are preserved by these substances. In the case of autogenous vaccines they are largely prepared and preserved with alcohol.
Nosodes are defined as remedies taken from diseases and prepared homoeopathically.
Varieties. Vaccines are divided into : I. Stock; 2. Autogenous, and 3. Mixed.
A stock vaccine is made from the culture of pathogenic organisms and may be used on any patient.
An autogenous vaccine is made from cultures taken from the patient himself, and can be used in his case only. The autogenous vaccines are considered to be much more efficacious than the other varieties.
A mixed vaccine is used where there are two or more germs of a disease in a given case, and a mixed vaccine may be either stock or autogenous. Dr. Burney Yeo, of England, terms the mixed vaccine the “blunderbuss.” We have a similar word. namely, “shot gun” prescribing.
The requisites for a good vaccine, according to Runnels, are the following:
1. It must be identical with the toxin of the organism infecting the case to be treated.
2. All germ life must be destroyed.
3. It must be put up so as to be incapable of infection.
4. Its administration must be unobjectionable.
Vaccines Compared with Nosodes. Dr. J. G. Hare, of the London Homoeopathic Hospital, recently completed a stock of the various vaccines for dispensary use in the 3x and 30x potencies as per the following :
1. Staphylococcus multivalent.
2. Streptococcus mixed.
3. Staphylococcus aureus.
4. Staphylococcus albus.
5. Bacillus acnes et staph.
6. Micrococcus catarrhalis.
7. Bacillus coli.
8. Bacillus influenza.
9. Pneumococcus pure.
10 Pneumococcus multivalent.
1. Gonococcus.
12. Bacillus typhosus.
The nosodes in use in the homoeopathic school with date of introduction are the following which may be either official (stock) autogenous, auto-haemic or possibly mixed.
1. Psorinum, about 1833.
2. Anthracinum, first used in 1836.
3. Hydrophobinum, proved in 1833, fifty years before Pasteur.
4. Medorrhinum, used in 1875, by Dr. Biegler, of Rochester, N.Y.
5. Syphilinum, used in 1879, and proving published in 1880.
6. Tuberculinum introduced by Swan in 1879.
7. Variolinum used as early as 1871.
8. Vaccinum used in 1873, and account published in the American Institute Transactions.
9. Diphtherinum introduced by Lux and used by Swan.
10. Pyrogen first mentioned by Dr. Drysdale, of England, in 1880.
In 1875 Dr. Burdon Sanderson wrote in the British Medical Journal, “Only liquids which contain bacteria are capable of setting up pyrexia.”
11. Micrococcinum and Oscillococcinum, the first discovered by Doyen and the second by Roy in 1925 have been used by our french confreres in the 30th and 200th potencies in cancer but without success, in the reason being that cancer is not microbic in origin. (Vannier.)
To this list might be added many others, for example, Petrussin or Coqueluchin, introduced by clarke in 1996. Morbillin, Malandrinum, Sepsin, and of course, the various tuberculins employed under many different names.
Here we have a remarkable similarity in the two lists, thus our Medorrhinum corresponds to the Gonococcus and Psorinum to the various staphylococcus and streptococcus vaccines and the pyrogen to antifebrile vaccines, and many hat have as yet no been appropriated by the allopathic school.
Administration. The nosodes should be used according to symptoms and not according to the disease. Dr. H.C. Allen’s work on the Nosodes gives the entire symptomatology. They have a particular influence in chronic and rebellious affections where there is a lack of reaction to curative measures. As examples we may cite:
Tuberculinum in the tubercular diathesis.
Psorinum for cutaneous or psoric affections,
Medorrhinum in sycotic cases.
Syphilinum in syphilitic inheritance.
Vaccines are administered (I) hypodermically, and (2) orally. The hypodermic method naturally finds its advocates in the allopathic school, it rightly judging that the whole subjects of vaccine therapy is near enough to homoeopathy without the oral use of the vaccine.
The oral method has met with much more favor in the homoeopathic school for scientific and clinical reasons. It presents, according to Drs. Burnett and runnels, the following advantages.
1. Simplicity of technique.
2. The abolition of the negative phase, thus being in harmony with use of our drugs, which cure without doing harm.
3. The immunization results are more perfect. This has been demonstrated in the laboratory and clinically. Dr. Eaton, of Des moines, proved conclusively that the oral administration of Variolinum was just as efficient, if not more so, than the old time scarification method. The authorities mentioned above also proved in the laboratory that by the oral administration of vaccines the opsonic index was raised and, later, his was clinically verified.
4. It avoids the possibility of injecting live germs into the patient’s tissues. Here are avoided lockjaw, paralysis and other accidents such as not uncommonly follow the use of impure virus reported so frequently by the press following vaccination and so well known in the homoeopathic school even in Hahnemann’s time who gave us Thuja as on of the antidotes to troubles arising from vaccination.
The simplicity of technique is one that will appeal to all physicians. If vaccine therapy is to be so difficult of application that only laboratory men and men in the pharmaceuticals houses can apply it, it will die a natural death. Dr. Nowell, of Boston, states: “Most vaccine prescribing is done by those who are totally unfit to do so, and after everything else failed.”
The abolition of the negative phase is desirable, at least the aggravation should be of the regular homoeopathic kind.
Applicability of Vaccine Treatment. Dr. C. A. Burnett, Dean of the New York Homoeopathic Medical College, once well summed up the uses of vaccine treatment as follows:
1. It is applicable only where the diagnosis is known.
2. It is not applicable to diseases which are not known to be of bacterial origin.
3. It should not be used where the clinical picture is incomplete.
The Homoeopathicity of the Vaccine Therapy. There are many points of similarity between vaccine therapy and homoeopathy. In fact, the vaccine of to-day is the nosode of yesterday. The points of similarity are the following:
1. The use of similar remedy. There are no real provings of the vaccines, yet it is stated that the autogenous vaccine is the quintessence of individualization. There can be no question of its being a crude sort of homoeopathy, but true homoeopathy is applicable even where the diagnosis is not satisfactorily determined. It is not necessary to know that a case is rheumatism when Rhus is indicated, but it is necessary to know that it is a streptococcic infection to decide upon the proper vaccine unless we use the “blunderbuss” which Dr. Hare calls scientific nosode. As a matter of fact, the nosodes are quite as scientific as the vaccines. The nosodes cover homoeopathically the mixed infections and provings show their indications. Vaccines in their purity would be a single organism, but few, it any, infection are from a single bacterinum, hence, the “blunderbuss,” hence, for instance, the following catarrhal sample put out by a purveyor of vaccines. The vaccine is decidedly a mixed one, it contain :
1. Friedlander’s bacillus.
2. Micro coccus catarrhalis.
3. Pneumococcus.
4. Streptococcus.
5. Staphylococcus py. aureus.
6. Staphylococcus py. albus.
Are the nosodes, Psorinum or Pyrogenium, less scientific than this sample?
2. The use of the small dose. This is another point of similarity between the vaccine therapy and homoeopathy. Observers find that the small dose in much more efficacious. Dr. Runnels states that his doses equal in general the 6x potency and most observers are using much higher potencies.
Professor of Materia Medica in the University of Michigan Homeopathic Medical College. Member of American Institute of Homeopathy. In addition to his editoral work he authored or collaborated on: Boericke and Dewey's Twelve Tissue Remedies, Essentials of Homeopathic Materia Medica, Essentials of Homeopathic Therapeutics and Practical Homeopathic Therapeutics.