Military conscription needs drove Egypt’s police, medical, and vaccination systems.

Evidence

For example, as we have seen, effective surveillance and policing systems that would enable the military authorities to track down and catch deserters were generalized throughout the country to establish a truly controlled society where individuals and their movements were monitored. In addition, the army’s need to screen the conscripts medically, to treat them for disease, and to maintain a healthy environment in the crowded camps and barracks provided the impetus to found a medical school, to institute a country-wide vaccination program, and to make the bodies of the soldiers (and eventually of civilians as well) available to the self-assured medical gaze. — Khaled Fahmy, All the Pasha_s Men_ Mehmed Ali, his…, 1667