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No treatment is available, and the only protection is vaccination. The virus is usually transmitted by prolonged face-to-face contact with a person showing symptoms. The incubation period averages 12–14 days. [18] One of the most feared diseases of human history, smallpox was still causing an estimated 2 million deaths every year as late as 1967.
Smallpox was an infectious disease caused by variola virus (often called smallpox virus), which belongs to the genus Orthopoxvirus. [7] [11] The last naturally occurring case was diagnosed in October 1977, and the World Health Organization (WHO) certified the global eradication of the disease in 1980, [10] making smallpox the only human disease to have been eradicated to date.
The smallpox vaccine is used to prevent smallpox infection caused by the variola virus. [10] It is the first vaccine to have been developed against a contagious disease. In 1796, British physician Edward Jenner demonstrated that an infection with the relatively mild cowpox virus conferred immunity against the deadly smallpox virus.
First writings documenting variolation in China appear around 1500. Scabs from smallpox victims who had the disease in its mild form would be selected, and the powder was kept close to body temperature by means of keeping it close to the chest, killing the majority of the virus and resulting in a more mild case of smallpox. [108]
The symptoms of smallpox are rash on the skin and blisters filled with raised liquid. [ citation needed ] The disease killed an estimated 400,000 Europeans annually during the 19th century and one-third of all the blindness of that time was caused by smallpox. 20 to 60% of all the people that were infected died and 80% of all the children with ...
Walking pneumonia infections rose nationwide as kids returned to school this fall. The infection can be tricky to diagnose, and testing is expensive. Doctors may choose different antibiotics to ...
Roughly 1 million adults in the U.S. seek hospital care due to pneumonia and 50,000 people die from it each year. "Pneumonia can become dangerous if it goes unrecognized and untreated.
If I’m an adult, should I be worried about walking pneumonia? Walking pneumonia is more common in kids. (The largest bump in cases over the last six months was found in children ages 2–4, per ...