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Child receiving an oral polio vaccine.

Vaccination is the administration of antigenic material (the
vaccine) to produce immunity to a disease. Vaccines can
prevent or ameliorate the effects of infection by a
pathogen. Vaccination is generally considered to be the most
effective and cost-effective method of preventing infectious
diseases. The material administrated can either be live but
weakened forms of pathogens (bacteria or viruses), killed or
inactivated forms of these pathogens, or purified material
such as proteins. Smallpox was the first disease people
tried to prevent by purposely inoculating themselves with
other types of infections; smallpox inoculation was started
in China or India before 200 BC.[1] In 1718, Lady Mary
Wortley Montagu reported that the Turks had a habit of
deliberately inoculating themselves with fluid taken from
mild cases of smallpox, and that she had inoculated her own
children.[2] Before 1796 when British physician Edward
Jenner tested the possibility of using the cowpox vaccine as
an immunisation for smallpox in humans for the first time,
at least six people had done the same several years earlier:
a person whose identity is unknown, England, (about 1771); a
Mrs. Sevel, Germany (about 1772); a Mr. Jensen, Germany
(about 1770); Benjamin Jesty, England, in 1774; a Mrs.
Rendall, England (about 1782); and Peter Plett, Germany, in
1791.[3]
The word vaccination was first used by Edward Jenner in
1796. Louis Pasteur furthered the concept through his
pioneering work in microbiology. Vaccination (Latin:
vacca—cow) is so named because the first vaccine was
derived from a virus affecting cows—the relatively benign
cowpox virus—which provides a degree of immunity to
smallpox, a contagious and deadly disease. In common speech,
‘vaccination’ and ‘immunization’ generally have the same
colloquial meaning. This distinguishes it from inoculation
which uses unweakened live pathogens, although in common
usage either is used to refer to an immunization. The word
“vaccination” was originally used specifically to describe
the injection of smallpox vaccine.[1][3]
Vaccination efforts have been met with some controversy
since their inception, on ethical, political, medical
safety, religious, and other grounds. In rare cases,
vaccinations can injure people and they may receive
compensation for those injuries. Early success and
compulsion brought widespread acceptance, and mass
vaccination campaigns were undertaken which are credited
with greatly reducing the incidence of many diseases in
numerous geographic regions.