(Moscou) Une lettre de l’impératrice russe Catherine II appelant à se faire immuniser contre la variole est exposée à Moscou, avant sa mise aux enchères, un document historique faisant écho aux difficultés de la vaccination anti-COVID-19 en Russie.
La pièce autographe datée du 20 avril 1787, époque à laquelle émergeaient les premiers procédés vaccinaux contre la variole, ordonne d’organiser une campagne d’inoculation contre cette maladie, alors ravageuse dans des régions de son empire aujourd’hui situées en Ukraine.
La lettre a été présentée jeudi à Moscou où elle sera exposée jusqu’au 30 novembre.
Le courrier doit être vendu aux enchères en décembre à Londres par la maison MacDougall’s avec un portrait de l’impératrice, un double lot estimé à 1,2 million de livres (1,6 million de dollars).
« Une des [tâches] the most important must be the introduction of inoculations against smallpox which, as we know, causes great ills especially among ordinary people, ”the Empress wrote to Count Pyotr Rumyantsev, a regional governor.
“This type of inoculation should be generalized everywhere”, continues the sovereign.
Catherine La Grande was the first in her empire to be vaccinated against smallpox, making her case an example to all her subjects.
“In view of the conditions today [avec la pandémie de COVID-19] we must be proud of Catherine, ”said Ekaterina MacDougall, of the eponymous auction house, presenting the letter.
Russian President Vladimir Putin took several months to announce his COVID-19 vaccination, even as he encouraged the Russians to do so without delay with vaccines developed in Russia.
The COVID-19 immunization campaign has since lagged behind, with only 36% of the population having received a full vaccination schedule, with widespread suspicion of the sera deployed as early as December 2020 under the leadership of the Kremlin. .
According to Mme MacDougall, the Empress launched an “incredible” propaganda campaign to convince the population to get immunized.
“The population was afraid, it was new and frightening”, noted the historian Oleg Khromov, during the presentation of the letter, judging the missive “unique, especially in view of the contemporary situation”.
Catherine, who ruled the Russian Empire from 1762 until her death in 1796, had an infected sample inoculated by an English doctor. She was ill for a time but was declared recovered in October 1768.
When the French King Louis XV died of smallpox in 1775, she had deemed it “barbarous” to die of this disease during the Enlightenment.
“I really hope that soon, in the near future, we will also say: it is barbaric to die from COVID-19 at 21e century, ”noted Ekaterina MacDougall.