Is it true that orphanages in the Russian Empire were created as a platform for an experiment on smallpox vaccination?

There is an opinion that the entire system of caring for orphans in the Russian Empire was built in order to conduct medical experiments on children without parental care, including testing the safety and effectiveness of smallpox vaccination. We decided to check whether such a practice really existed.

Information about this purpose of orphanage institutions can be found meet mainly on social networks, in particular they indicate that “the first orphanage in Moscow appeared in 1764. And what do you think is the purpose of its creation? You will probably say - caring for orphans? But no, it turns out that in fact the first smallpox vaccine was tested there on children. In this Syropital House, the mortality rate of children ranged from 87 to 100% per year.” Even about cruel experiments on orphans removed Youtube movie.

Smallpox is one of the oldest viral infections, some biologists even suggest, that in the biblical story about the ten plagues of Egypt, the phrase “and there will be inflammation with boils on people and on livestock throughout the whole land of Egypt” refers specifically to a smallpox epidemic. Mortality from smallpox was extremely high - every sixth to eighth adult and every third child died. Unlike the plague, which came in waves, smallpox was consistently present in the population. Even in German existed the saying “few people manage to avoid smallpox and love,” and in France the police indicated the absence of smallpox on the face as a special sign of the wanted person. 

History of smallpox prevention shares into two stages - the variolation stage and the vaccination stage. Variolation is a way to prevent a severe course of the disease by placing the contents from a ripe pustule of a smallpox patient into a healthy body. Written mentions of her dated VIII century. There were different technologies for conducting it - the pumped-out contents were rubbed into incisions, injected subcutaneously, a thread was soaked in it and it was inserted into a puncture under the skin. In this case, the vaccinated person developed a disease, which most often occurred in a mild form. However, the immune system did not always react predictably, and the rules of the procedure were often violated, which led to additional infection with other infections (erysipelas, syphilis). English doctor Heberden counted, that with the introduction of "pus rubs" in 40 years in London, smallpox claimed 25,000 more lives than in the previous forty-year period.  

The first public vaccination took place in 1796, spent British physician and naturalist Edward Jenner. He noticed that people who had cowpox did not get the natural disease, so he removed smallpox from the hand of a girl with cowpox and inoculated it subcutaneously into an eight-year-old boy, James Phipps. The child developed a local reaction at the injection site with slight discomfort, but without a general course of the disease. Then, a month and a half later, Jenner injected the boy with smallpox, and he developed the disease. Based on this, Jenner concluded that cowpox vaccination is more effective and safer. That is, in orphanages in 1764, for chronological reasons, they could not conduct experiments with smallpox vaccination and, for logical reasons, with variolation, which had been used for almost a millennium. 

The need to create state institutions for children left without parental care was already understood by Peter I. In 1715 he published decree “On the creation of hospital hospitals in cities at churches for the reception and maintenance of illegitimate children”, previously the same initiative was local implemented Novgorod bishop Job in 1706. Foundlings and illegitimate children were accepted into the orphanage, and the one who brought the child was guaranteed anonymity.

In 1763, Catherine II established the Moscow Imperial Orphanage. From the very day the Orphanage was founded, children began to be brought there. Due to the fact that there was neither a building nor personnel, the children were placed in foster families and the mortality rate in the first years was indeed colossal and could reach 870 deaths per 1000 children. The figure looks scary compared to the infant mortality rate in 2020 amounted to 4.5 per 1000, that is, almost 200 times lower. However, for many reasons, it is incorrect to compare the indicators of the 18th century with today: methods of caring for premature babies have improved dramatically, vaccination is practiced from the first days of life and a more caring attitude towards motherhood and childhood on the part of the state, as well as the overall quality of life has improved significantly.

Historians report that the average infant mortality rate in the mid-18th century reached 30%. At the same time, it is again incorrect to compare the average mortality rate in the country and mortality in state institutions; the same Moscow Orphanage initially received children with congenital diseases, weak, unwanted and weakened by malnutrition, both their own and their mothers during the gestation period. Also mortality is regular increased in the summer months, as wet nurses were busy with field work, and children weaned too early often died due to severe enteritis (inflammation of the small intestine). 

Estimates of the actual mortality rate in shelters differ - Soviet pediatrician E.M. Conus wrote about a mortality rate exceeding 80%, but modern scientists think her numbers are inflated because she analyzed data during years of infectious disease outbreaks. In particular, using a figure from the report of the chief physician of the Moscow Orphanage N.F. Miller in 81%, E.M. Konyus does not mention that it refers to the years when a smallpox epidemic raged in Moscow. So here the effect is essentially replaced by the cause. Smallpox vaccination using the Jenner method in the Moscow orphanage started only in 1801, so the figures indicate mortality from smallpox itself and from socioeconomic causes, not from vaccination.

And although experiments on smallpox vaccination were not carried out on orphans in the Russian Empire, this is the practice in the world existed. In particular, the British King George I, before deciding to undergo variolation for himself and other members of the royal family, conducted an experiment on seven prisoners sentenced to death in exchange for pardon and on six orphans from an orphanage. All participants in the experiment survived, and the royal family was still vaccinated against smallpox. Even more controversial experiment, but with a different virus, was conducted in the USA by Dr. Saul Krugman. From 1955 to 1970, he deliberately infected residents of Willowbrook, a home for children and adults with severe developmental disabilities on Staten Island, New York, with hepatitis by injection and by feeding them chocolate milk mixed with the feces of the sick to study the development of immunity to the disease. 

Thus, orphanages in the Russian Empire were created only to improve the social conditions of the population. We were unable to find convincing evidence to support smallpox vaccination experiments there. However, in history there are confirmed examples of orphanages where wards actually became experimental subjects in unethical medical experiments, sometimes even without their consent.

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Read on the topic:

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2. How vaccines changed the world. History of vaccinations from the 18th century to the present day
3. Paevsky, Khoruzhaya: Actually a PLAGUE! medical history from fever to Parkinson's