Hey this may interest you if you don’t already know, but there was an early form of inoculation called “variolation” for smallpox. There were a few different methods but generally an individual with a more mild case would have biological material (powdered scabs or pus fluid) taken from them, and somehow put into a healthy individual. I think the safest method was rubbing infected biological material into an open wound. The person would be sick for a few days, and get better and rarely get sick again.
It’s obviously way riskier than our immunization techniques today, but while 30% of normal cases of smallpox died, only 2% of people variolated died.
I don’t know if this is actually applicable to cats since this was made specifically for smallpox, and I’m not yet sure if there’s any other old methods of inoculation. But yeah. Regardless I think this is really cool :)
Variolation is actually a specific term for a method of inoculation against the variola virus, which causes smallpox! Nowadays, we're able to inoculate people against many diseases, but "early forms" of inoculation were all variolation.
This causes some confusion, because the first vaccine was created from cowpox to FULLY immunize patients against smallpox. The term "vaccinate" even comes from the Latin word for cow (vacca). But these are all terms with distinct meaning.
Variolation: Using infected biological material from a patient with smallpox to inoculate another patient, in the hopes of vaccinating them.
Inoculation: Introducing viruses and/or microorganisms into something else, usually in an attempt to induce immunity. But, you could also inoculate bacteria into a petri dish, or inoculate your dough with yeast.
Vaccination: Inoculation with a vaccine against a disease.
Variolation is a type of inoculation, but not all inoculations are vaccinations. A chickenpox party is an inoculation event; not a vaccination event. Variolation and vaccination are done to immunize patients, and inoculation usually is too unless you're baking something.
(also I'm flexxination against alla youse who've had chickenpox in the past. Couldn't be me I've had ALL my shots. My ass is SAFE from shingles ✨)
Smallpox was actually the only disease that inoculation worked on in ancient times. That's because variola was special. It had two common forms-- Variola Major and Variola Minor. If you HAD to have smallpox, you wanted Minor because it was much less severe than Major. Plus, by inducing the illness, you could make sure the patient was at PEAK health before they went to fight it.
A lot of people actually think that variolation was invented in the 1800s by Edward Jenner (he invented the smallpox vaccine), or get confused about the difference between vaccination and inoculation. The funny truth is actually that Europe was LATE to start practicing variolation-- it only came to England itself in the 1700s, when it had been standard practice for hundreds of years in most of the Old World. Possibly as far back as the Song dynasty.
(philomena cunk voice: variolation was the first technique of its kind in history. except chinese history)
In fact, the Chinese had it down to a process. Identify a case of Variola Minor, dry the scabs for several days to weaken the virus, grind it with some other medicines into a powder, and then pack it in cotton and administer with a silver (antimicrobial) tube up the nostril. Meanwhile, over in England, they'd just slap that shit in an open cut on your hand.
(also also, the practice was probably in Britain before the 1700s. But it was in Wales, so, the English ignored that. variolation was the first technique of its kind in history. except chinese history. and welsh history. and african history. an-)
Anyway, back to cats.
Like I mentioned, there's no disease (to my knowledge) that you can be inoculated for in the same way as smallpox. That said... I think creating some fake diseases would be a VERY fun thing to do.
There's also a HUGE lack of variety in the diseases of canon. Almost every major disease outbreak is simply a respiratory illness-- the only one that actually involved any skin symptoms was the Red Cough of DOTC. Ideally, I'd like to turn coughs from the majority of illnesses into the minority, and generally a deadly minority.
(Some of the types of disease I'm going to make more of; foodborne, waterborne, and zoonotic illnesses. Rabies is eradicated in England, but I do want bats in particular to be carriers of a disease that Vow Cats refer to with a term like "karmic retribution." "Serves-you-right-itis." "Chronic L-Taking Disease.")
So, there's a chance I use inoculation as a method at some point. I might even keep it in my back pocket as a good way to demonstrate how the Wardens* have a specialty for medicine.
(* = im officially renaming the tribe. stay tuned for total map reworks, they're going to live in the mountain that's getting dropped on Hollyleaf.)
