Variolation shortly after variolation began to outweigh the benefits of the procedure. From the 1760s, a number of individuals, including John Fewster, Peter Plett, Benjamin Jesty, and particularly Edward Jenner, were interested in the use of material from cowpox, an animal infection, to protect against smallpox. In 1796, Jenner vaccinated James Phipps, did more vaccinations in 1798, and was the first to publish evidence that cowpox protected against smallpox, was safer than variolation, and that his vaccine could be maintained by arm-to-arm transfer. The use of variolation soon began to decline as the smallpox vaccine became widely used and its benefits
History of smallpox 10th century. Methods of carrying out the procedure varied depending upon location. Variolation was the sole method of protection against smallpox other than quarantine until Jenner's discovery of the inoculating abilities of cowpox against the smallpox virus in 1796. Efforts to protect populations against smallpox by way of vaccination followed for centuries after Jenner's discovery. Smallpox has since been completely eradicated since 1979, because of the mass vaccination efforts of the World Health Organization. The word variolation is synonymous with inoculation, insertion, en-grafting, or transplantation. The term is used to define insertion of smallpox matter, and distinguishes this procedure from