Like said elsewhere -- we don't know what would be the "safe enough" method, on another side, desperate times... https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Variolation http

Like said elsewhere -- we don't know what would be the "safe enough" method, on another side, desperate times... https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Variolation https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Variolation Still, there is a nice bit of history behind the concept, as an example, the story about how Britain learned about the method: "It would not be until Italian physician Dr. Emmanuel Timoni of Constantinople promoted the practice that variolation began its spread through Western Europe. After coming across the practice in Constantinople, Timoni wrote a letter describing the method in detail which was later published in the Philosophical Transactions in early 1714.[6]:77 His account would become the first medical account of variolation to appear in Europe. Although the article did not gain widespread notoriety, it caught the attention of two important figures in the variolation movement, Bostonian preacher Cotton Mather and the wife of the British Ambassador to the Ottoman Empire, Lady Mary Wortley Montagu." "No stranger to smallpox, Lady Mary had lost her brother to the devastating disease. Soon afterwards, she also contracted smallpox. Although she survived, she was left with severe facial scarring. While in Turkey she came across the process of variolation as it was practiced amongst the people of Constantinople. She first mentioned variolation in the famous letter to her friend, Sarah Chiswell, in April 1717.[7]:55 in which she enthusiastically recounted the process, which in Constantinople was most commonly administered by experienced elderly women. In 1718, she had the practice conducted on her five-year-old son, Edward Montagu. The procedure was supervised by the embassy doctor Charles Maitland. On her return to England, she had her four-year-old daughter inoculated in the presence of physicians of the royal court in 1721.[1]:90 Both variolations proved successful. Later on that year Maitland conducted an experimental inoculation of six prisoners within the Newgate Prison of London. In the experiment, six condemned prisoners were variolated and later exposed to smallpox with the promise of freedom if they survived.[2]:45 The experiment was a success, and soon variolation was drawing attention from the royal family, who helped promote the procedure throughout England. However, variolation caused the death of Prince Octavius of Great Britain, eighth son and thirteenth child of King George III in 1783." https://www.nlm.nih.gov/exhibition/smallpox/sp_variolation.html https://www.nlm.nih.gov/exhibition/smallpox/sp_variolation.h... "Variolation was never risk-free. Not only could the patient die from the procedure but the mild form of the disease which the patient contracted could spread, causing an epidemic."