§ Mr. Viantasked the Minister of Health what steps are being taken by his Department to reduce the number of cases of, and deaths from, post-vaccinal encephalitis to which reference is made in the recent report of the Chief Medical 218W Officer of his Department for the six years of war; and whether he is in a position to report any further developments in connection with the experiments on the production of chick-embryo vaccine lymph, to which reference was made in the annual reports of the Chief Medical Officer of his Department for the years 1934 and 1938.
§ Mr. BevanEncephalitis is a rare complication of measles, mumps, chickenpox, influenza and other conditions, including vaccinia. The risks of the complication may be greatly minimised if primary vaccination is carried out in early infancy, as has been frequently emphasised by the Chief Medical Officer of my Department, and not left until a child has reached school age or early adolescence. Experimental work on chick-embryo vaccine has continued in an endemic smallpox are in India, but there is, as yet, no evidence that it confers adequate protection against small pox, or that its employment does not involve a risk of encephalitis.