Scourge: The Once and Future Threat of Smallpox

Smallpox is back into the news with a VENGEANCE these days...and Scourge's theme becomes as timely -- informative, troubling and, when you ponder it, TRAGIC -- as ever. But make no mistake about it: this book is NOT just doom-and-gloom: the underlying message is that man battled smallpox -- the airborne, spitting cobra of diseases --throughout the centuries and eventually won. And even though it looks like a merciless segment of mankind (terrorists or terrorists-sympathizing governments) could WITTINGLY unleash this disease that already killed millions, mankind conquered smallpox once -- and it can do so again......but it will cost many lives. Just look at some recent news stories. It recently was revealed that some Russians died during the 70s of what was suspected to have been a "perfected" form of weaponizedsmallpox secretly developed by their own government to use against the United States. July 2002: a news story notes a US plan to immunize nurses doctors and other health workers first and provide for treatment and mass vaccination AFTER the fact. July 2002: a news story says volunteers are trying a 50-year-old smallpox vaccine in the US, where vaccinations haven't been offered since 1972 (and they wear off after 10 years). In Scourge, biological and technical weapons expert Jonathan Tucker gives you the PERFECT briefing book on how the disease works, how it is spread, how doctors have painstakingly battled to decrease its murderous capacity over the centuries, and how, in 1978 under WHO's remarkable Dr. DA Henderson, international doctors proclaimed a relentless campaign against the disease over and successful: smallpox was completely erradicated. One of the book's most fascinating parts is how he traces smallpox's use(with little remorse) as an early biological weapon by colonists against Native Americans, by the British against Americans and others. And why not? The disease kills 30 percent of the people who get it in the most horrific, painful ways: it would literally bring an enemy to its knees. This clearly-written, fast moving book then shifts: to one of the greatest betrayals of mankind. And when the shift comes you are shocked...and sickened. Tucker outlines in great detail how the rumors were confirmed: yes, the Soviet Union had LIED -- and HAD maintained smallpox stocks and HAD worked on developing it for use as The ULTIMATE biological weapon (confirmed by recent news reports). The Soviets wanted to "perfect" smallpox as a lethal weapon that could kill up to 100 percent of the time (in other words 30 percent was too low a death rate for them) -- to spray or bomb via missile or plane to finish off an already-reeling US population after a catastrophic nuclear attack. Today, Tucker notes, it's feared that virus stocks are held by North Korea, Iran, Iraq and China. Even worse: there are fears that terrorists can get -- or already have -- thesmallpox weapon. All this in a world in which countries have stopped smal

Mr. Jonathan B. Tucker has not offered readers a rapidly compiled, superficial report, in response to the attacks of September 11 and the concerns raised since then. This work is not sensationalized although the effects of certain strains of this disease are hard to describe without appearing gratuitously graphic. There are a wide variety of strains of this virus provided by nature that are truly horrific. Then there are engineered strains that are man-made for use only as weapons that justify questioning how we as a species have survived this long, and how easily the time for many could be abbreviated.The author traces the disease from Ancient Egypt, to, and until the successful end of an international effort to remove the disease from the planet. This particular member of The Pox Family of viruses does not have a host, like Malaria's Mosquito. It exists only in humans, and unlike Anthrax that can remain dormant; when Smallpox is killed it stays that way. The eradication of this health menace is one of the great accomplishments of medicine and of mankind; unfortunately the story does not yet have a happy ending.Until 1992 when a Russian Scientist defected and brought the story of Russia's massive Bio-Weapons program in Siberia to the world's attention, it was widely believed that there were only two relatively small amounts of the virus in existence. One location was at The Center For Disease Control in Atlanta, and a single locale in Russia, which in reality was more than one, inclusive of a massive facility for engineering new strains of the virus and the means to deliver them at a facility in Siberia. The Soviets were not content with a virus that countries had stopped protecting their populations with; they were creating more vicious strains by adding, in one example, a Hemorrhagic aspect to the disease. This is the type of virus associated with Ebola.When the USSR imploded there was technology for sale, scientists, and the diseases they had created. It now is believed that North Korea, Iraq, and Iran have the virus, and other nations may have it as well. The World Health Organization had been attempting to destroy all the viral stocks, however they have been blocked not only by The United States and Russia, but many in the scientific community as well. Spring of 2002 was to be the date for final destruction of all stockpiles; this date would now appear highly unlikely.The book gives a very good historical overview of Smallpox and the effects it has had on history. Smallpox has been used as a weapon in war and the effects were devastating. The only technology involved was giving away blankets that the sick had been wrapped in, or sending carriers of the disease amongst the enemy. This was Smallpox as nature created it, and how 17th and 18th century warfare delivered it. The book also goes into great detail about the delivery systems that could be launched upon missiles with multiple warheads, which could release the virus over large areas.Un

This book was written from extensive interviews with Dr. Henderson, the CDC and Johns Hopkins public health physician who headed up the program to eradicate smallpox from the world, believed to be successful as of 1980. So the stories from that fight to rid the world of smallpox are fascinating and authoritative.The story continues through Henderson's effort to get rid of the last government storage freezers of the virus -- and his failure, because of what the government knew and he didn't: the Russians had been growing tons of smallpox for years and loading them in ICBMS aimed at the U.S. It was a terrific betrayal.Big, big question facing us today: When the Russians dismantled their biowarfare program, did anyone get some leftovers?So now the entire world, completely unvaccinated, is vulnerable to this terrible disease, just as the Aztecs were when a handful of armored Spanish soldiers (and one slave with smallpox) destroyed their entire civilization. In the wargames played with biowarfare using smallpox attacks on American cities, the outcome was not favorable. And at the end, players were using ancient techniques because the vaccine had quickly run out: arm-to-arm vaccination, variolation, the goal at that point just being to save as many people as possible. This book tells how to do those easy and old techniques.History, descriptions, facts, transmittal, symptoms, all you need to know about smallpox should there actually be some out there after all.It is to be hoped that no one will never actually need any of the information in this book. If not, the historical record of the eradication of the disease makes vivid reading in itself.

Mr. Tucker has written a highly readable account of one of the great killers of human history. Starting with background on smallpox: the course of the disease, its effect on humnan history, its use as a biological weapon, and moving through to the early work of Jenner in the field of vaccination, and the awe-inspiring triumph of the campaign to eradicate this terrible disease, this riveting account paints a portrait of one the great public health achievements of the 20th, or any, century. From that high point, the author then goes on to describe the hideous betrayal of that achievement by the very people who had first proposed undertaking the eradication of smallpox: the former Soviet Union. He lays out the Soviet bioweapons program that secretly kept the virus alive and kicking, and the Soviets' attempts to combine the virus with other viruses to create an even more powerful bug. Given recent events, this book's timing and message could not be better. Scourge is not an alarmist book, rather, a sobering one.