Variolation

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1720s In the 1720s, Lady Mary Wortley Montagu introduced to England the Near Eastern practice of variolation, i.e., the deliberate infection of a healthy subject with dried pus from smallpox pustules through an incision in the upper arm.
1840 The 1840 act Made variolation illegal.
1840-1898 Vaccination Acts of 1840, 1853, 1867 and 1898
In addition, inoculees posed a clear transmission risk to the rest of the population. As a result of these concerns, every colony except Pennsylvania passed laws to restrict the practice.
The practice of variolation spread slowly to Europe's ruling classes, raising hopes that smallpox might be conquered and complementing Enlightenment precepts of applied reason and proactive statehood.
Variolation had other drawbacks, for example, cost, including not only the hefty price of the procedure itself but also the labor time lost during the 1- to 2-month preparation for and recovery from the induced illness.
Variolation or inoculation was the method first used to immunize an individual against smallpox (Variola) with material taken from a patient or a recently variolated individual, in the hope that a mild, but protective, infection would result.