Page 90 - VHSA - Onderstepoort 100 Years - Part 3

OND
ERSTEPOORT 100
Vaccine production and Onderstepoort
Biological Products Ltd. R.D. BIGALKE, B.J. ERASMUS AND C.M. CAMERON
TIntroduction
he recognition of the significance of micro- organisms in normal life and disease by the chemist Louis Pasteur in the 1880s marked the birth of an exciting new scientific field which aimed at the
elucidation of the causes and possible prevention, control and cure of infectious diseases. Pasteur developed a vaccine against anthrax as an immediate result of his discovery. Robert Koch placed particular emphasis on infectious diseases by linking specific micro-organisms, as aetiological agents, to a large number of them. The subsequent development of the disciplines of serology and immunology facilitated the use of practices such as vaccination for the prevention of a wide variety of diseases. However, credit for the discovery of vaccination as a method to control an infectious disease must go to Edward Jenner for his pioneering research on the prevention of smallpox as early as the late
1700s.
The purpose of this article is primarily
to outline the role that Onderstepoort played in vaccine development and pro- duction in South Africa. However, the history of some of the vaccines themselves are also included, to serve especially as mileposts for the reader.
Vaccine production before
Onderstepoort
The medical doctor, A. Edington, in his laboratory in Grahamstown, apparently manufactured the first successful vaccine for animal use in South Africa in 1887. It was blackquarter vaccine. From 1892 he also produced a lungsickness vaccine that was probably of some use. His vaccine against African horsesickness and his early rinderpest (RP) vaccine were certainly not. He also made a smallpox vaccine, which was reasonably effective, but the Zuid- Afrikaansche Republiek (ZAR) subsequently gave the job to Arnold Theiler (later Sir Arnold Theiler) and Cecil Schultz (district surgeon of Johannesburg) in 1894 who produced an excellent vaccine for use in the ZAR.
Theiler was educated in veterinary science (qualifying in 1889) at the time that infectious diseases were ‘top of the pops’. He must therefore have been intensely aware of their importance and the value of vaccination when he arrived in the ZAR in 1891. He used imported blackquarter vaccine on a farm close to Pretoria in 1892 and published his results in 1894. Then followed the development of a vaccine against RP by H. Watkins-Pitchford and Theiler at Groot Marico using the serum-virus method at the end of 1896. Koch, however, managed to publish the discovery of his primitive ‘bile vaccine’ against RP first and undeservedly got most of the credit.
In July 1898 Theiler founded his first permanent laboratory at Daspoort, previously planned to be a ‘disinfection station’ for the disinfection of animal products, such as hides and skins that were possibly contaminated with RP virus. He called this
Bluetongue vaccine production in 1912
180
PART 3
History of Individual Disciplines
1908-2008
Years