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Politics : Foreign Affairs Discussion Group -- Ignore unavailable to you. Want to Upgrade?

To: KLP who wrote (67739)	1/22/2003 4:59:08 PM
From: Ilaine	Read Replies (3) \| Respond to of 281500

Hi KLP - the "missing" vials were plague, aka the Black Death, scientific name Yersinia Pestis, a bacillus (bacteria), not smallpox. Plague is endemic among rodents and such in the Southwest but doesn't really kill people like it used to. Could be it mutated. Smallpox is a virus, and has been eradicated in the real world, but still exists in laboratories. The Russians and the US admit to having it. It is commonly estimated that Iraq, North Korea, and France have some, too. The reason people think that Iraq has smallpox, as I understand it, is that some of their military have been immunized. www1.umn.edu So it's less common than you fear but more common than Mq hopes. We all hope it's never released but I am glad they've developed vaccines. Several of my family members are health care providers but they're all administrative now except my brother who is a nurse practitioner for several Indian reservations in Arizona. I expect he'll be glad to take the vaccine when offered. Edit: some researchers dispute the statement that plague/Yersinia Pestis caused the Black Death. They think it was a virus similar to Ebola. abcnews.go.com