This Article  • Full text  • PDF  • Correction  • Send to a friend  • Save in My Folder  • Save to citation manager  • Permissions  Citing Articles  • Citing articles on HighWire  • Citing articles on Web of Science (2)  • Contact me when this article is cited  Related Content  • Similar articles in JAMA  Social Bookmarking   What's this?

Joan Stephenson, PhD

JAMA. 1998;279:897-899.

	Since this article does not have an abstract, we have provided the first 150 words of the full text and any section headings.

EXTINCTION is forever, defenders of endangered species often say, and the loss of an organism from the face of the earth strikes most people as an unfortunate, even tragic, loss—with 1 notable exception.

That exception is the smallpox virus, which was virtually banished (aside from research specimens in 2 laboratories, in the United States and Russia) from the globe in 1977.

In the 2 decades since that singular triumph, public health experts have contemplated campaigns for global eradication of diseases, as well as the potential costs of failed efforts.

If all goes well, polio and dracunculiasis (Guinea worm disease) will join smallpox as eradication success stories sometime early in the next century, public health experts said last month in Atlanta, Ga, at a conference on global disease elimination and eradication. The meeting gathered more than 200 experts in public health, health systems, and infectious and noninfectious diseases, . . . [Full Text of this Article]

CiteULike    Connotea    Del.icio.us    Digg    Reddit    Technorati    Twitter     What's this?

THIS ARTICLE HAS BEEN CITED BY OTHER ARTICLES

Guinea Worms
Hall
Radiology 1999;210:881-881.
FULL TEXT