�鶹��ý

Skip to content

Review: Smallpox: The death of a disease by D.A. Henderson

By Debora Mackenzie

27 May 2009

�鶹��ý. Science news and long reads from expert journalists, covering developments in science, technology, health and the environment on the website and the magazine. — As we worry about a possible flu pandemic, it is heartening to read about the one germ we did defeat
(Image: Prometheus Books)

1969: the Smallpox Eradication and Measles Control Program was underway in Niger, West Africa — 1969: the Smallpox Eradication and Measles Control Program was underway in Niger, West Africa
(Image: CDC / Dr. J. D. Millar)

A transmission electron micrograph (TEM) of smallpox viruses — A transmission electron micrograph (TEM) of smallpox viruses
(Image: CDC / Phanie / Rex Features)

I FIRST met D. A. Henderson at the World Health Organization’s headquarters in Geneva in 1984, shortly after the ancient scourge of smallpox had been officially eradicated by the campaign that Henderson masterminded. One of the biggest killers in history,…

Sign up to our weekly newsletter

Receive a weekly dose of discovery in your inbox. We'll also keep you up to date with �鶹��ý events and special offers.

Sign up

or

Existing subscribers

1

Exclusive report: Inside Chernobyl, 40 years after nuclear disaster

2

How to spot the Lyrid meteor shower tonight

3

Electric vehicle owners could earn thousands by supporting power grid

4

The rise, the fall and the rebound of cyclic cosmology

5

From autism to migraines, birth order may have wide-reaching effects

6

The biggest threat to Chernobyl is no longer radiation

7

The man who crawls into the perilous heart of the Chernobyl reactor

8

Our dreams become more emotive and symbolic as we approach death

9

Chimpanzee group's violent rupture hints at evolutionary roots of war

10

Neanderthal infants were enormous compared with modern humans