curl-6 said:
Smallpox samples are indeed kept in high security labs in both the US and Russia, yes. And if it ever did get loose, yeah it would be absolutely catastrophic. Aside from military personnel nobody is vaccinated against it anymore, and we know from history that when Smallpox breaks out in an unvaccinated population the result is utter carnage. (See the native populations of the Americas in the years following contact with Europeans) That said, we do at least have a working vaccine against it, but probably nowhere near enough of it stockpiled to stem a global pandemic, unless we are able to quickly isolate it in the very early stages, like when ten or less people are infected, quarantine those people, and vaccinate all their contacts. I honestly wouldn't worry about it though, of all the things that could kill millions of people in the foreseeable future, there are many more probable threats than Smallpox, scary as it is. |
Not to mention that in countries, even very rich ones, with low public funding for health and high household debt, a credit crunch could kill more people than any plague could in a modern country with modern and effective health system, through a wide range of common diseases that normally would have far lower mortality. Fundamentalist tycoons, instead of funding terrorists, a risky business, could just buy as many banks as possible, then they could kill millions without any bomb and in a totally legal way, heck, they could even seize the properties of the people they try to kill.
