Historical aspects of immunization and vaccine safety communication.

It has been a long journey starting from the beginnings of variolation [3] leading up to the greatest success in the history of immunization: the eradication of smallpox [39]. Today, vaccines are an acknowledged important medical advance [40]. Nevertheless, immunization has been the subject of public controversy on several occasions [15, 24, 31]. This article shall provide a short overview of some aspects of the early stages of immunization in Western countries, including some examples of vaccine safety controversies in the past.