variolation

1. (historical) The inoculation of a person with smallpox with the intention of inducing a mild form of the illness and subsequent immunity to the disease.Examples: "Variolation is no longer used today. It was replaced by smallpox vaccination, a safer alternative, which in turn led to the development of vaccines against many other diseases."; "To accomplish this, variolation—the use of the smallpox virus—was introduced into military conscription. The practice of variolation that was later routinized in the Qing dynasty was basically a form of vaccination against smallpox."; "Vaccination refers to inoculation with live Vaccinae variolae (cowpox) virus. Variolation refers to inoculation with live Variolae major (smallpox) virus. Both variolation and vaccination are efforts to generate immunity against smallpox. Variolation was employed by practitioners in China and the Middle East for centuries and by farmers and laborers in rural England, where it was referred to as "buying the pox.""countablehistoricaluncountable