"vaccine"

[Arnold M. Zwicky]

On Apr 1, 2007, at 7:28 AM, Dave Wilton wrote:

> The original vaccine, the one for smallpox, has long been used to
> infer
> immunity on those already exposed to the disease in addition to the
> use as a
> preventive measure.

... infer immunity on...

is this an anticipation of the prefix in "immunity"?  or a glitch in
word retrieval?  or an intended (but innovative) use of
"infer" (where "confer immunity (on)" is the usual idiom)?

i got only one google webhit for "infer immunity on":

Vaccines are created by manufacturers and are given, usually by
injection, to infer immunity on the receiving individual to a
specific infectious disease. ...
www.articleworld.org/index.php/Category:Vaccines

a handful of relevant hits for "infer immunity to [a disease]" and
maybe a couple of dozen for "infer immunity" without an object.

ca. 137,000 for "confer immunity", 771 for "confer immunity on".

arnold

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