Who doesn't hate smallpox?

[HuckleB]

http://scienceblogs.com/whitecoatunderground/2010/05/who_doesnt_hate_smallpox.php

"Smallpox was one of the world's most devastating diseases, and its eradication one of medicine's most spectacular successes. Over the course of a couple of centuries, this disease went from killing and maiming millions (200-500 million in the 20th century alone), from helping to depopulate the Americas of their original populations, to an historical artifact. The history of the eradication of smallpox is generally pretty well-known. Most of us learned at some point about Jenner's discovery of smallpox vaccination and the eventual disappearance of the disease due to the efforts of the WHO. But what is less well-known is the history of opposition to smallpox prevention.

...

At the end of the 18th century, Edward Jenner made his famous observations that mild cowpox infections appeared to protect people against smallpox, and conducted experiments that validated these observations. Vaccination, named for the cowpox virus (vaccinia) was widely adopted as safer than variolation, and laws were passed in England mandating its use as a public health imperative.

Shortly after the passage of these laws, anti-vaccination groups emerged complaining of the attacks on their civil liberties and parental rights. Similar movements appeared in the United States and were associated smallpox outbreaks. Opponents to vaccination used all the contemporary tools of propaganda, including editorial cartoons, and characterizations of vaccination as a child-devouring monster.

...

In the end, it was not the assertions of vaccination supporters or detractors that decided the issue. It was the results of "free and rational inquiry", the collection of data, and the use of this data in an organized, global eradication plan that turned smallpox into a distant memory. And yet the same vapid, evidence-free arguments still dominate the debate about vaccination. Two hundred fifty years have done little to change the inherent suspicions and empty arguments of those who battle against vaccination, but despite this, we are still generally winning."


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Oh, but how history does repeat itself...


:yoiks:

[pgarrison]

1. Thank God it's almost erradicated

It used to occur often in many countries a few decades ago.

[HuckleB]

3. Indeed.

[PalMD]

5. clarity?

I thought I'd made that clear in my piece, but maybe these comments relate to the deleted one?

[HuckleB]

6. Is that really all that important here?

[Berry Cool]

4. Smallpox isn't "almost" eradicated, it IS eradicated.

It has been since 1979.

[Name removed]

2. Deleted message

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