Edward Jenner God for the good which he has made me the instrument of conveying to my fellow creatures." However, his contemporary Rabbi Israel Lipschitz in his classic commentary on the Mishna Tiferet Yisrael wrote that Jenner was one of the "righteous of the nations," deserving a lofty place in the World to Come, for having saved millions of people from smallpox. In 1979, the World Health Organization declared smallpox an eradicated disease. This was the result of coordinated public health efforts, but vaccination was an essential component. Although the disease was declared eradicated, some pus samples still remain in laboratories in
Edward Jenner experience needed to become a surgeon himself. In 1770, Jenner became apprenticed in surgery and anatomy under surgeon John Hunter and others at St George's Hospital. William Osler records that Hunter gave Jenner William Harvey's advice, well-known in medical circles (and characteristic of the Age of Enlightenment), "Don't think; try." Hunter remained in correspondence with Jenner over natural history and proposed him for the Royal Society. Returning to his native countryside by 1773, Jenner became a successful family doctor and surgeon, practising on dedicated premises at Berkeley. Jenner and others formed the Fleece Medical Society or Gloucestershire Medical Society, so