Viola Epidemic: A Brief History Of Smallpox

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Imagine it, you’re a Native American in 1763. Men come on your land handing out blankets ,after a day of using the blanket you begin to get a fever. Two days later you begin to receive a rash, bumps filled with pus all across your body, sound familiar?You didn’t know then but we know now that this was smallpox,but what is smallpox? How did it start? Is the virus still active? What is its history? No matter what your question is (In regarding to smallpox) it will be answered today in my essay.

Smallpox is a disease caused by the complicated variola virus.The result of smallpox is a high fever and pus filled blisters on the skin. Smallpox is spread through saliva , coughs/sneezes, sharing of needles,and skin to skin contact. Smallpox has been around since or before 3000 years ago with the earliest case being in 1157 with pharaoh Ramses V. ,his mummified body indicates the scars of pockmarks, but there is no actual way to know when or how smallpox originated. …show more content…

This idea came from Edwards milkmaid Sarah Nelmes and James Phipps, a 9 year-old son of Edwards gardener. Edward injected the cowpox virus into James. James was now infected with cowpox (cowpox Ian not deadly ) After this he injected the smallpox virus into James. James showed no signs of the smallpox disease, this made the worlds first vaccine , the smallpox

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