Vaccination: a history. The industrialisation of vaccines production

Par Hervé BAZIN*

*Dr vétérinaire, Dr ès Sciences, Pr émérite de la faculté de Médecine de l’Université de Louvain, Administrateur scientifique principal de la Commission européenne (e.r.), Membre de l’Académie vétérinaire de France, email herve-marie.bazin@wanadoo.fr

Communication présentée le 16 novembre 2013

Success of vaccines as the ‘cowpox/vaccine’ against the smallpox or those of the Salk, Lépine or Sabin against the poliomyelitis, or yet the vaccine against the cattle plague, have allowed to eradicate the smallpox and the cattle plague or to greatly diminished the great damages make by the polio virus. However, the passage of a limited use of the vaccines to a much larger one has obliged to improve their productions in quality, quantity, and also in price. This paper emphasizes the major contribution of both the professors Herman Frenkel and Charles Mérieux in establishing large cellular cultures giving the possibilities to use vaccines in case of epidemics or epizootics to the reduction of some contagious diseases as the poliomyelitis or even the eradication of some ones as the smallpox or the cattle plague.

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