Smallpox virusIn 1993, the U.S. Centers for Disease Control, Atlanta, Georgia, announced that the smallpox virus stockpile would now not be destroyed. The last specimens of the virus to exist on Earth had been secured in storage in 600 frozen vials in Atlanta and Russia, ready to make vaccine should it ever again be necessary. This reversed an earlier decision for final destruction of the last remnants of smallpox with heat on 31 Dec of the same year. Scientists who wanted to continue research on the virus stopped the destruction plan. Smallpox (variola) had been one of the world's most dreaded plagues until 1977, when it was declared eradicated. Its name comes from the pockmarks on the skin that it caused. |
