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A disability act? The Vaccine Damage Payments Act 1979 and the British government’s response to the Pertussis vaccine scare

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Millward, Gareth (2017) A disability act? The Vaccine Damage Payments Act 1979 and the British government’s response to the Pertussis vaccine scare. Social History of Medicine, 30 (2). pp. 429-447. doi:10.1093/shm/hkv140

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Official URL: http://dx.doi.org/10.1093/shm/hkv140

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Abstract

The Vaccine Damage Payments Act 1979 provided a lump-sum social security benefit to children who had become severely disabled as a result of vaccination. It came in the wake of a scare over the safety of the whooping cough (pertussis) vaccine. Yet very little has been written about it. Existing literature focuses more on the public health and medical aspects of both the Act and the scare. This article uses material from the archives of disability organisations and official documents to show that this Act should be seen as part of the history of post-war British disability policy. By framing it thus, we can learn more about why the government responded in the specific way that it did, as well as shed new light on public attitudes towards vaccination and disability.

Item Type: Journal Article
Subjects: R Medicine > RA Public aspects of medicine
Divisions: Faculty of Arts > History
Library of Congress Subject Headings (LCSH): Whooping cough -- Vaccination -- Great Britain, Disabilities -- Government policy -- History
Journal or Publication Title: Social History of Medicine
Publisher: Oxford University Press
ISSN: 0951-631X
Official Date: 1 May 2017
Dates:
DateEvent
1 May 2017Published
4 August 2016Available
2 December 2015Accepted
Date of first compliant deposit: 19 February 2019
Volume: 30
Number: 2
Page Range: pp. 429-447
DOI: 10.1093/shm/hkv140
Status: Peer Reviewed
Publication Status: Published
Access rights to Published version: Open Access
RIOXX Funder/Project Grant:
Project/Grant IDRIOXX Funder NameFunder ID
Placing the Public in PublicHealth: Public Health in Britain, 1948–2010Wellcome Trusthttp://dx.doi.org/10.13039/100010269

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