Kōrero: Epidemics

Child with smallpox, 1904

A young girl with spots all over her body sits on a nurse’s knee.

Smallpox was a highly infectious and deadly disease. Sufferers were often thickly covered with large, prominent, fluid-filled spots all over their body and sometimes internally. This girl, who had not been vaccinated, is infected with smallpox. If she survived, she was probably badly scarred for the rest of her life. Presumably the nurse on whose knee she is sitting has been vaccinated.

Te whakamahi i tēnei tūemi

Te Ara - The Encyclopedia of New Zealand
Reference: Appendices to the Journals of the House of Representatives, H-31, 1904, p. XVI

Ngā whakaahua me ngā rauemi katoa o tēnei kōrero

Te tuhi tohutoro mō tēnei whārangi:

Geoff Rice, 'Epidemics - The influenza era, 1890s to 1920s', Te Ara - the Encyclopedia of New Zealand, http://www.TeAra.govt.nz/mi/photograph/27787/child-with-smallpox-1904 (accessed 19 April 2024)

He kōrero nā Geoff Rice, i tāngia i te 5 May 2011, reviewed & revised 8 Feb 2024