title: [The meaning of vaccine or when predicting is a duty].
abstract: From the perspective of historiography, the article analyzes the construction of scientific medicine's major landmark: the small-pox vaccine. When this vaccine was created and widely distributed, the medical field demonstrated how technology controls life on a planetary scale. The great victory of scientific medicine rests on the fact that today the life of the small-pox virus depends upon laboratory conditions. Born in England during the 1870's, the anti-vaccine movement questioned universal, mandatory small-pox vaccination. The article examines some metaphors and analogies used by physicians and historians, revealing the process by which the vaccine, as a phenomenon, was constructed.
authors.forename: M
authors.initials: M
authors.lastname: Bahia Lopes
mesh_terms: D004992:Ethics, Medical / Q000266:history*; D049671:History, 18th Century; D049672:History, 19th Century; D049673:History, 20th Century; D006801:Humans; D007114:Immunization / Q000266:history*; D012899:Smallpox / Q000266:history*; D014611:Vaccination / Q000266:history*; D014612:Vaccines / Q000266:history*
chemical_list: D014612:Vaccines
vernacular_title: O sentido da vacina ou quando o prever é um dever.