http://www.nytimes.com/library/world/global/042399smallpox-germ.html

Against advice he is keeping smallpox. And plans to RESEARCH IT WITH RUSSIA!

What is Klinton up to now? Is this why he is bringing Albanians into the country? Maybe he has a surprise for us come y2k? I see how it is coming together now.

Keep your guns loaded and ready for use!

-- J Gott (jgot12@aol.com), April 23, 1999

Answers

Is this a troll?

I despise BJ Clinton, the NWO, etc., but burning the smallpox viri would be stupid. Since innoculation against smallpox stopped in 1972 (or so), we have no immunity in the young (under 30). Today, a "terrorist" (from our perspective) could 1) get a smallpox shot, 2) cover themself with smallpox vaccine and 3) get on a plane into (for example) NY. Smallpox would spread via passengers all around the country during the incubation period. Naturally, there would be other (similar) ways to start a plague.

We need the smallpox viri to produce vaccines, if needed. Other countries (Russia at a minimum) still have smallpox, so USA elimination of it would not eliminate it from the planet.

-- Anonymous99 (Anonymous99@Anonymous99.xxx), April 23, 1999.

Soeey...But I do believe that it is cw pox which is the virus which makes a peson immune to small pox. At least Louie Pastur found that this was so. The Dutchman

-- Dutchman (Electric@shock.owee), April 23, 1999.

Sorry, but I thought that it was exposure to cow pox which gave one immunty from small pow.... At least this is what my history book says that Louie Pastur found out The Dutchman

-- Dutchman (Electric@Shock.owee), April 23, 1999.

Dutchman - I believe some of the modern variants are generally resistant to traditional treatment regimens...though I don't know that for certain.

Arlin

-- Arlin H. Adams (ahadams@ix.netcom.com), April 23, 1999.

Well, smallpox (Variola).

Coincidentally did a report for a group of RNs on this very subject about 18 months ago.

Here's some little tidbits:

"Cowpox" is smallpox which has 'run through' cattle and lost some of its virulence -- it was Jenner in the 18th century who noticed that milkmaids seemed to be very resistant to smallpox -- especially after being infected with a very mild skin rash they got from cows. Jenner (after much persuation) was able to convince some townsfolk to have a tiny bit of fresh pus from a cow's rash sore scratched onto their skin. At the site of the scratch, a small raised blister developed (some of you older folks still have a similar scar where you got your shot) and voila! -- a decreased chance of acquiring the much-more-serious smallpox. FYI Founding Father John Adams, as a child, was one of the early innoculees (is that a word?).

Cowpox is now so rare that the average vet has never seen it. It is rare because the human-cow-etc transmission no longer takes place. Do not count on the Jenner-method for protection!

Monkeypox is a similar disease, but it doesn't affect humans (except rarely), and doesn't confer smallpox immunity.

People vaccinated for smallpox (the 30+ crowd) may or may not still retain immunity. Although we were told the vaccination would be "for life", no one really knows how long it will last.

There is a 7-17 day incubation period.

The disease is spread by respiratory secretions (i.e., airborne), and by sore crusts. The crusts (just little scabs) carry the virus, even when dried, and may stay viable (that is, able to spread disease) for an indefinite period of time. (This is one reason why it is so dangerous for archeologists to be exhuming the previous century's plague deaths while looking for artifacts in old cemetaries!) In fact, one of the primitive methods of "vaccinating" against smallpox was to place a crusty scab into the patient's nose. Yuck.

When smallpox was around, in different regions of the world, different fatality rates were common -- less than 2% in the US; over 30% on the Indian Subcontinent. Blindness, scars, lung diseases -- and even a nasty thing called disseminated intravascular coagulation (where the blood actually starts clotting in your veins and arteries) -- are all associated with the disease. But that was before we had a lot of immune-suppressed people in the general population (chemotherapy patients, organ transplantees, lupus, other immune-system diseases). Diseases can "cycle through" the immune-suppressed and come out A LOT more virulent on the other side.

Smallpox is viral; antibiotics don't work against it.....they'll only help against secondary infections. The only treatment is careful bedrest and cleanliness. Getting the disease DOES confer lifetime immunity.

Maybe somebody is working on a virus-suppressing or immune-boosting treatment for smallpox -- but if they are, it isn't being written about or discussed in the literature.

There is not enough vaccine in existence to handle more than 2 million people in the US -- and it probably wouldn't be you or me who'd get first crack at it.

Very few doctors today would recognise smallpox -- most have never even seen a case of measles! Even if your doc goes to his Merck's Manual, THERE IS NOTHING ON SMALLPOX IN IT!!! In order to research my report for the nurses, I had to go back to an "old" textbook on Pediatric Infectious Diseases published in 1987....and that said that smallpox was globally eradicated in 1979!

Best preventatives: take immune-boosting vitamins, wash your hands after toileting and before eating, cover coughs and sneezes and encourage others to do so, don't handle somebody else's used tissues.

And, of course, try to live a good clean life.

Anita Evangelista (RN)

-- Anita Evangelista (ale@townsqr.com), April 23, 1999.

I just he doesn't realese the dreaded "smallcox" virus.

-- J Holmes (DeIRiK@DIGinLER.cum), April 23, 1999.

It was just reported today that the millions of vials of crystaline vaccine stored for twenty years ALL had defective stoppers, SO WE HAVE ZERO VACCINE !! Sorry. Smallest error and ... you know the rest. Got gas masks ??? Eagle

-- Hal Walker (e999eagle@freewwweb.com), April 23, 1999.

Please provide link or source for "bad stoppers" item. Thks.

-- Anita Evangelista (ale@townsqr.com), April 24, 1999.