Smallpox Essay

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Smallpox
Throughout the 15th to 18th century, smallpox has successfully ruined the lives of millions, either leaving them disabled for life or annihilating them. It is a dreadfully contagious disease that infects people from all ages by disturbing the work of cells and may result in organ failure.

Smallpox is highly contagious because it is triggered by a virus called Variola Major. Viruses, compared to bacteria and fungi, are a whole lot easier to be transmitted. They can even be transmitted through air from an infected person or object when just standing next to them. Once a person gets infected, symptoms won’t manifest until the approximate seventh day, which are high fever, chills, severe headaches and backaches, discomfort and uneasiness. The fever may rise up to 41̊̊C and when the body starts rejuvenating, do not mistake that act as the process of recovering because just a little while after that, skin lesions like spots and blisters will start developing. After a few days, the blisters will dry and turn into scabs, which will remain in the skin for approximately a month before it falls off. Here’s the most terrifying part: The scabs are filled with virus and may fall off and attach to your clothes, bed sheet, towels or anything and anyone you have contact with infecting them with the great smallpox, too.

As mentioned before, smallpox may lead to the failure of organs. This result is caused by the damaging of cells. And why does the cells damage? Smallpox can be easily and more efficiently spread through the inhalation and exhalation of a person, which means that the virus, according to Vijaya Khisty Bodach, will first get inside the cells lining the throat and hijack the cellular machinery to make millions more smallpox ...

... middle of paper ...

...a vaccinated person growing cow heads was made. Unfortunately for those horrible people, the advantages and protection that Jenner’s discovery provided won over the derision.

Smallpox is now eradicated for good and it has been that way since the World Health Assembly decided to eradicate it in 1959. But that does not imply that the Variola Major virus is extinct. Also according to Vijaya Khisty Bodach, they still remain in freezers belonging to the governments for research and possibly deadly purposes for it may also be used as a biological weapon in light of terrorist attacks. Either way, if it is ever wildly spread again, we must all be aware for if you are once infected, there is no looking back. To this day, there is no known cure for smallpox. All we’ve got is a method of prevention so; let us just hope that the monster stays inside the freezer at any cost.

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