Ask HN: Where to find foundational studies for virology and germ theory? I'm curious where I can find the studies that prove: 1- viruses are contagious. 2 - viruses definitively cause negative symptoms. 3 - vaccines work to prevent symptoms beyond placebo effect. I have looked everywhere but unable to find anything more than "vaccines work because they do." type stuff from the CDC. I want to review the actual groundbreaking studies that virology and vaccine effectiveness are created from. |
> Since Dmitri Ivanovsky's 1892 article describing a non-bacterial pathogen infecting tobacco plants, and the discovery of the tobacco mosaic virus by Martinus Beijerinck in 1898,
For more details see original paper in https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Martinus_Beijerinck#cite_note-...
3) I think the biggest test was in 1954 for the Polio vaccine by Salk. From https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Polio_vaccine#1950%E2%80%93195...
> Salk's vaccine was then used in a test called the Francis Field Trial, led by Thomas Francis, the largest medical experiment in history at that time. The test began with about 4,000 children at Franklin Sherman Elementary School in McLean, Virginia,[68][69] and eventually involved 1.8 million children, in 44 states from Maine to California.[70] By the conclusion of the study, roughly 440,000 received one or more injections of the vaccine, about 210,000 children received a placebo, consisting of harmless culture media, and 1.2 million children received no vaccination and served as a control group, who would then be observed to see if any contracted polio.[39] The results of the field trial were announced 12 April 1955 (the tenth anniversary of the death of President Franklin D. Roosevelt, whose paralytic illness was generally believed to have been caused by polio). The Salk vaccine had been 60–70% effective against PV1 (poliovirus type 1), over 90% effective against PV2 and PV3, and 94% effective against the development of bulbar polio.[71]
Some links related to the test https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pmc/articles/PMC1114166/ https://www.history.com/this-day-in-history/polio-vaccine-tr...