CITIZENS CLAMORING FOR SMALLPOX VACCINE

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<cherokee

Thursday, December 27, 2001 12:15 PM

[CIDSNetwork] CITIZENS CLAMORING FOR SMALLPOX VACCINE

 

 

> CITIZENS CLAMORING FOR SMALLPOX VACCINE

>

> New batches of smallpox vaccine currently on order by the

> government won't be available until late winter, but citizens

> are already asking doctors, public health officials and

> politicians for access to it, according to a Washington Post

> report. Even Senator Arlen Specter (R-Pa.) has asked that his

> four granddaughters inoculated. However, the Bush

> administration has refused to release vaccine due to limited

> supplies and the vaccine's potentially dangerous side effects.

> " This is a societal question, " said Anthony S. Fauci, director

> of the National Institute of Allergy and Infectious Diseases.

> " We need to have a national discussion about what the risks

> are -- of an attack and of the vaccine -- and then make the

> appropriate decisions. " Smallpox was believed to have been

> eradicated by 1980, but it is highly contagious and kills

> 30 percent of its victims, prompting fears that a rogue nation

> or terrorist group may have gotten its hands on some. " Of all

> the agents that could be used, this is the one that worries

> public health the most, " said Fred Edgar Thompson Jr.,

> Mississippi state health officer. A full vaccination of the

> entire country would probably lead to 600 to 1,000 deaths

> due to encephalitis, according to Steven Black, a director

> of the Kaiser Permanente Vaccine Study Center in Oakland, CA

>

>