Smallpox vaccine Smallpox vaccine Smallpox vaccine, the first successful vaccine to be developed, was introduced by Edward Jenner in 1796. He followed up his observation that milkmaids who had previously caught cowpox did not later catch smallpox by showing that inoculated cowpox protected against inoculated smallpox. Dryvax is a freeze-dried calf lymph smallpox vaccine. It is the world's oldest smallpox vaccine, created in the late 19th century by American Home Products, a predecessor of Wyeth. By the 1940s, Wyeth was the leading US manufacturer of the vaccine and the only manufacturer by the 1960s. After world health authorities declared smallpox had been
Vaccination policy immunity against it. This protects those unable to get the vaccine due to medical conditions, such as immune disorders. Vaccine-preventable diseases remain the most common cause of childhood mortality with an estimated three million deaths each year. Each year, vaccination prevents between two and three million deaths worldwide, across all age groups, from diphtheria, tetanus, pertussis and measles. With some vaccines, a goal of vaccination policies is to eradicate the disease – make it disappear from Earth altogether. The World Health Organization coordinated the effort to eradicate smallpox globally through vaccination, the last naturally occurring case of smallpox was in