Cowpox to the mild form of smallpox and the observation that dairy farmers were immune from smallpox inspired the first smallpox vaccine, created and administered by English physician Edward Jenner. The word “vaccination,” coined by Jenner in 1796, is derived from the Latin root "vaccinus", meaning of or from the cow. Once vaccinated, a patient develops antibodies that make them immune to cowpox, but they also develop immunity to the smallpox virus, or "Variola virus". The cowpox vaccinations and later incarnations proved so successful that in 1980, the World Health Organization announced that smallpox was the first disease to be eradicated
1978 smallpox outbreak in the United Kingdom 1978 smallpox outbreak in the United Kingdom The 1978 smallpox outbreak in the United Kingdom resulted in the death of Janet Parker, a British medical photographer, who became the last recorded person to die from smallpox. Her illness and death, which was connected to the deaths of two other people, led to an official government inquiry and triggered radical changes in how dangerous pathogens were studied in the UK. The government inquiry into Parker's death by R.A. Shooter found that while working at the University of Birmingham Medical School, she was accidentally exposed to a strain of smallpox virus that