One thousand words ==================
![][1] Figure. **This WHO photograph, apparently taken in October 1975 of a 3-year-old Bangladeshi girl named Rahima Buna, records “the last case of smallpox on the Asian subcontinent.” This was the last case of wild variola major in the world; the last case of wild variola minor occurred in a 23-year-old Somalian, Ali Maow Mallin, in December 1977. Smallpox had two additional victims, however. An unvaccinated staff photographer, Janet Parker, was infected in a university laboratory in Birmingham, England, in 1978; her death precipitated the suicide of the laboratory's director. Ever since the WHO declared the world eradiction of smallpox in 1979, infectious disease experts and military strategists have debated whether remaining stocks of the virus (in the United States and Russia) should be destroyed. The present-day spectre of biological terrorism makes particularly poignant an editorial note by W. F. Foege and W. R. Dowdle in a 1997 issue of the***** Morbidity and Mortality Weekly Report*** (MMWR 1997;46[42]:992-4). Reflecting on the fact that 20 years had elapsed since the eradication of naturally occurring smallpox, they wrote: “Some things need be done only once in the entire history of the world. The development of smallpox vaccine and the eradication of smallpox disease are on the list. ... For the first time, social justice in public health has been achieved, with everyone benefiting from a body of scientific knowledge and experience. ... [W]orld cooperation reached an unprecedented level in the 20th century, making this bequest [to future generations] possible.” — Anne Marie Todkill, *CMAJ* Photo by: D. Tarantola / World Health Organization : [1]: /embed/graphic-1.gif