ATTENTION has often been drawn to cases of naturally-acquired smallpox in the English Royal Family.1 However, the death in 1783 of an English Prince from inoculated smallpox has been neglected by medical historians. An analysis of the circumstances is presented here. The principal source of information was a member of the Royal Household, Charlotte Papendiek, whose personal experience of smallp...

Edward Jenner, born in 1749, grew up in Berkeley, Gloucestershire, and pursued his interest in medicine in London where he became a student and lifelong close friend of John Hunter the anatomist and surgeon. Jenner returned to Gloucestershire in 1772. At that time, smallpox was an infectious scourge affecting mainly children. Most who reached adulthood had been exposed to the disease with a cas...

In 1796, 75 years after Lady Mary Wortley Montague and Charles Maitland introduced inoculation into England, Edward Jenner performed an experiment that would eventually lead to the eradication of smallpox and the end of inoculation. (NB: in this article, inoculation refers to immunization with smallpox virus and vaccination refers to immunization with cowpox virus.) He inoculated a child with m...

CONTEXT Neurologic illness is an infrequent but severe adverse event associated with smallpox vaccination. The reinstatement of smallpox vaccination in the United States in response to possible bioterrorism renewed concerns about vaccine-related adverse neurologic events. OBJECTIVE To determine rates and describe the clinical features of neurologic events associated with smallpox vaccination....

Writing in the " Sunday Express " on the Health of 1922, Sir Arthur Griffith-Boscawen says that the recent visitation of smallpox should serve as a warning. " Great Britain, though an island and itself virtually free from smallpox, is in these days of new-fashioned transport in closer touch than ever with overseas countries which have not yet succeeded in stamping out smallpox from their midst....

Variola, the agent of smallpox, is a bioterrorist threat, as is monkeypox virus, which also occurs naturally in Africa. Development of countermeasures, in the form of improved vaccines, antiviral drugs, and other therapeutic strategies are a high priority. Recent advances in molecular biology and in animal model development have provided fresh insight into the virulence determinants for smallpo...

Smallpox was the first human disease to be eradicated, through a concerted vaccination campaign led by the World Health Organization. Since its eradication, routine vaccination against smallpox has ceased, leaving the world population susceptible to disease caused by orthopoxviruses. In recent decades, reports of human disease from zoonotic orthopoxviruses have increased. Furthermore, multiple ...

The history of smallpox eradication in the 20 countries of West and Central Africa from Mauritania to Zaire is recounted, including background, evolution of strategy, assessment, maintenance, costs, and significance of the campaign. Smallpox was endemic in these countries, peaking each year at the end of the spring dry season, usually occurring in isolated villages only periodically. The aver...

Smallpox, which currently is only of historical interest, was once one of the most terrible illnesses with high mortality and morbidity. In the late 18th century, the English physician and naturalist, Edward Jenner (1749 - 1823), discovered an efficient preventive technique against smallpox which he termed "vaccination". Afterwards, the practice of vaccination gradually became widespread when f...

In 1980 the World Health Organization declared that smallpox was eradicated from the world, and routine smallpox vaccination was discontinued. Nevertheless, samples of the smallpox virus (variola virus) were retained for research purposes, not least because of fears that terrorist groups or rogue states might also have kept samples in order to develop a bioweapon. Variola virus represents an ef...