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Chapter 51: Threats of the 18th Century, Differences in the Queen's Choice

During the days when the countess was suffering from smallpox, Catherine and her son Paul hid in Tsarskoe Selo with great fear. Later, they moved from Tsarskoye Selo to various villas in the countryside, avoiding contact with any outsiders. They hid for several days.

months.

Smallpox was treated by taking injections from the infected tissue of recovered mild cases of smallpox, a technique that was used in England and the British North American colonies around 1765.

However, the European continent is very secretive about this new technology, and it is generally believed that there are high risks.

The grandfather of Scottish doctor Thomas Dimsdale traveled to America in 1684, and Dimsdale received a medical degree from the University of Edinburgh and published "A New Method of Inoculation for Smallpox", claiming to reduce the risks of vaccination.

The book was published four times in England. When Catherine heard about it, she invited him to Russia.

Dimsdale arrived in 1768, bringing his son and assistants with him.

Although Dimsdale believed that his method reduced the risk of vaccination, he was still shocked when he heard Catherine's words.

Because Catherine, who was already the empress at the time, asked to be vaccinated first.

Dimsdale suggested consulting a royal doctor first, but Catherine thought it was unnecessary because some doctors couldn't even cure flea bites.

Dimsdale retreated to the next best option and begged him to conduct inoculation experiments on women of the same age first, but Catherine vetoed it again.

Then, out of caution, Dimsdale asked to wait a few more weeks, and this time Catherine agreed.

Ten days before the vaccination, Ekaterina began to stop eating and drinking, and took mercury, crab foot powder and tartar emetics.

At 9 o'clock in the evening on October 12, 1768, Dimsdale injected smallpox pus extracted from the rural boy Alexander Markov into both arms of Catherine. Later, the boy was awarded a title.

Lord.

The day after the vaccination, Ekaterina took a carriage to Tsarskoye Selo, avoided the crowd and began to wait for the results.

She was active outdoors for two to three hours every day, and she began to feel slightly uncomfortable. Some pustules appeared on her body, but they scabbed over within a week.

Three weeks later, Dimsdale announced that the vaccination was successful and Ekaterina returned to normal life.

Catherine returned to St. Petersburg on November 1, and doctors subsequently vaccinated Paul.

Both the Senate and the Congress expressed congratulations on Ekaterina's vaccination.

Ekaterina said:

"The reason why I can lead by example is to save countless of my subjects from the fate of death. They know nothing about the significance of this new technology, are afraid, and are always under the threat of smallpox."

Following Catherine's demonstration, 140 nobles in St. Petersburg were subsequently vaccinated, and then Dimsdale vaccinated 50 people in Moscow. His book was published in Russian, and then Russia in St. Petersburg

, Moscow, Irkutsk and some other cities have also opened clinics dedicated to vaccination.

In 1780, 20,000 people in Russia participated in the vaccination, and by 1800, the number of vaccinated people reached 2 million.

For Dimsdale's contribution, Catherine made him a baronet and awarded him a bonus of 100,000 pounds and a lifetime annuity of 500 pounds.

In 1781, Dimsdale visited Russia again and inoculated Catherine's eldest grandson, Alexander the Two-Faced.

Sometimes Peter had to admire Catherine's courage. Even in the 21st century, who would dare to inject smallpox pus into the body easily?

But Catherine dared, she was still a queen.

All countries in Western Europe praised Catherine for taking the lead in vaccination, and Voltaire even praised it.

Before the vaccination, Frederick, the only talker, wrote to Catherine not to take risks.

Just six years after Catherine was vaccinated, in May 1774, King Louis XV of France died because he slept with a girl infected with smallpox, ending his 59-year rule.

His successor, Louis XVI, was only 19 years old at this time. The lesson was clear to him and he immediately got vaccinated.

But besides smallpox, another disease was even more terrifying to Russia: the bubonic plague, the Black Death.

Three years after Catherine's battle with smallpox, Russia entered a fight with even more terrifying opponents.

This disease has long spread in the areas bordering the European parts of Russia and Turkey. People believe that this disease will only break out in warm climate conditions, but they do not understand the relationship between fleas, rats and the Black Death.

The traditional preventive measure is isolation, which ranges from isolating suspected patients to the military sealing off the entire area.

In March 1770, cases of bubonic plague appeared among the Russian troops stationed in Turkey's Wallachia Province on the Balkan Peninsula. In September, the epidemic spread to Kiev in Ukraine.

After autumn, the weather turned cooler and the spread of the epidemic slowed down, but a large number of refugees began to flee to the north.

In mid-January of the following year, the panic among the people seemed to have subsided. However, as soon as the ice and snow began to melt after spring, the typical black patches and swollen glands appeared on the bodies of Moscow residents. In just one week, in a textile factory

160 workers were killed.

On March 17, Catherine issued a decree declaring emergency martial law in Moscow. Theater performances, dances and large gatherings were banned.

When a cold wave hit Moscow at the end of March, the death rate dropped sharply, and Catherine and city officials lifted the ban.

However, the epidemic broke out again at the end of June, and by August the disease swept across Moscow. Soldiers cleaning up corpses in the streets and alleys fell ill and died, and Moscow's chief medical officer also took a month off to receive treatment.

On September 5, Ekaterina learned that the average daily death rate of Moscow's population had climbed to three to four hundred. Bodies were thrown all over the streets. Checkpoints throughout the city were paralyzed. People in the city were facing

There was a threat of famine because supplies were no longer being brought into the city.

All patients regardless of gender and age must be sent to an isolation center.

The compulsory preventive measures triggered riots. The already frightened citizens of Moscow began to believe that it was the doctors and those medicines that had brought the disease to Moscow. People began to refuse to obey the ban on gathering in markets, churches, etc., and the ban on kissing, which was said to bring disease.

There are bans on the statues of gods who come to peace.

Instead, everyone gathered around the idol to seek comfort or salvation.

The statue of the Virgin Mary at the Vavasky Gate became a magnet.

Day after day, more and more patients are crawling at the feet of this statue, turning this place into the real center of the spread of the epidemic in Moscow.

Doctors are well aware of this situation, but no one has the guts to intervene.

Father Ambrose, the Archbishop of Moscow, was influenced by Enlightenment ideas. After seeing that doctors were helpless to deal with the situation, in order to prevent people from gathering together to reduce the chance of infection, Father Ambrose relied on his authority as a priest.

, quietly moved the statue of the Virgin at the entrance to the city of Vavaski under the cover of darkness.

He believed that once it was known that the priest had done this, everyone would go back to their homes, and the epicenter of the epidemic would naturally disappear.

As a result, the priest's painstaking efforts caused a riot.

The crowd did not disperse, and the people were outraged.

The priest fled into a monastery and hid in a cellar. The mob followed, dragged the priest out of the cellar and cut him into pieces.

The riot finally ended under the suppression of the army, with 100 people killed and 300 arrested.

Catherine realized that Moscow and the people in the city had lost control. The nobles had abandoned the city and fled to villas in the countryside. Factories and shops were closed one after another. Workers, serfs and urban farmers lived with nests of rats.

In the crowded wooden houses, rats were infested with fleas carrying disease-causing bacteria, so these people could only resign themselves to their fate.

At the end of September, the Queen received a report from the Governor of Moscow. The 72-year-old General Peter Saltykov stated in the report that the average daily death toll had exceeded 800 people. There was nothing he could do and the situation was completely out of control.

The general asked the empress for permission to leave Moscow temporarily and return to the city after winter.

The rising mortality rate, the tragic death of Father Ambrose and General Saltykov's absence from duty shocked Catherine. Faced with this disease that was more terrifying than smallpox, she fell into an unprecedented crisis.

Difficult situation.

At this moment, a man stepped forward and asked the Queen to allow him to go to Moscow to stop the spread of the epidemic and restore normal order.

This is the challenge this man seeks to regain his sense of self after years of idleness.

The Queen accepted the request.

Orlov was always eager to make a difference. Watching his brother Alexei and other officers continue to win victories in land and naval battles and receive high praise, he was frustrated when he was trapped in St. Petersburg.

Catherine ordered Orlov to take full charge of Moscow affairs. Orlov summoned a group of doctors, military officers and administrative officials, and led a team to Moscow overnight on September 21, and then immediately took over

Work in disaster areas.

Faced with a death rate of six to seven hundred people a day, he constantly sought the opinions of doctors and at the same time used force to suppress the citizens.

Not only did the coercive measures achieve results, but during the operation, Orlov accompanied the doctor to the patient's bedside and personally supervised the distribution of medicines.

Under his direction, rotting corpses were removed from houses and streets.

He also promised the serfs that anyone who took the initiative to help in the hospital would become a free citizen. At the same time, he also opened an orphanage, opened grain warehouses, and distributed relief funds.

In two and a half months, he spent 100,000 rubles to buy food and clothing for survivors, build shelters, burn the clothes of the deceased and more than 3,000 old wooden houses, and restore the compulsory system that had caused many riots.

Isolation measures.

Orlov rarely sleeps, and his professionalism, fearless attitude and dedication inspire others.

The cumulative number of deaths in September was as high as 21,000. By October, the number dropped to 17,561, 5,255 in November, and 805 in December. The gradual reduction in the number of deaths was partly due to Orlov’s measures.

The measures were effective, and the arrival of cold winter also played a certain role.

The improvement in the situation in Moscow and the hope brought by the coming winter allowed Ekaterina to survive this period. She had been worried that the epidemic would continue to spread to St. Petersburg in the northwest.

Suspected bubonic plague outbreaks have broken out in Pskov and Novgorod. The new capital, located on the banks of the Neva River, has also taken various preventive measures. Checkpoints have been set up on all roads entering the city.

Staff are also taking extra care when handling mail, and autopsies on deceased persons have become mandatory.

Catherine was afraid that domestic and foreign reports and gossip would have a negative impact on Russia, and she initially tried to suppress reports of mass deaths, public panic, and violence.

When the epidemic reached its peak, in order to deal with more inflammatory rumors that the government would bury patients alive, she allowed the government to release an official report on the Moscow riots, which was reprinted by newspapers around the world.

Catherine was depressed by the disaster, and in a letter to Voltaire she mentioned the death of Father Ambrose:

"The famous 18th century is so boastful. Look at how far we have developed."

In a letter to the former Chairman of the Communist Party of China, General Alexander Bibikov, she wrote:

"We have been suffering in this situation for a month. Peter the Great also went through this 30 years ago. He overcame all difficulties and got out of the predicament. Now we will also overcome the difficulties with glory."

In mid-November 1772, the epidemic eased, and Catherine allowed the people to hold collective prayers of thanksgiving.

Orlov returned to St. Petersburg on December 4, and was immediately honored and prosperous.

He received a solid gold medal, with a hero from Roman mythology cast on one side and a portrait of Orlov and the inscription "Russian heroes also emerge in large numbers" on the other side.

She also ordered someone to build an arch symbolizing triumph in the garden of Tsarskoye Selo. The decorative inscription on the door frame read "Dedicated to the great savior who saved Moscow from the plague."

Subsequently, in order to prevent another outbreak of the epidemic, isolation measures were maintained along Russia's southern border for the next two years. It was not until the war with the Ottomans broke out in 1774 that the isolation measures were lifted.

Although it was still early in history when smallpox and the Black Death broke out, the environment here awakened Peter's awareness of hygiene and building hospitals.

With him here, Orlov can naturally fight to his heart's content.

As far as he knew, the first hospital was opened in 1763 to train Russia's own surgeons and pharmacists.


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