A letter from Catherine the Great supporting mass immunization against smallpox sold at auction Wednesday in London. In the letter, dated April 20, 1787, the Russian empress instructs a governor-general of what is now Ukraine to make immunizing the public a priority and says that “such inoculation should be common everywhere.”
The letter sold at the MacDougall’s auction house along with a portrait of the empress painted by Dmitry Levitsky, for a total of ₤951,000. MacDougall’s said the letter reveals “the statecraft and foresight shown by the great monarch.”
