Talk:Smallpox/Archive 2

Is it necessary to have such a disturbing picture at the top of the article, or anywhere in the article for that matter? What do pictures of children add to the article that pictures of adults would not? —Preceding unsigned comment added by Flailing12 (talk • contribs) 00:19, 17 November 2010 (UTC)

Some Wikipedia people obviously have horrible taste. What if a child saw that awful picture? Wilsonbond (talk) 03:59, 17 November 2010 (UTC)

Are we supposed to find a nice picture for this horrible disease? Small pox was once the leading cause of death in the United States. Millions suffered and died. This is one of the great successes of medicine / immunization. It is one of the only disease that has ever been illuminated. Thus this picture stays. It reminds those who protest that we should no longer immunize children why we started in the first place. Hopefully people do see it so they understand.--Doc James (talk · contribs · email) 04:04, 17 November 2010 (UTC)

Replying to "What if a child saw that awful picture?" I showed my 2.5, 5, and 6 year children that picture this afternoon, explained to them what the disease was, how it killed so many people, what a virus is, etc. They are now more knowledgeable, and were not in the least "disturbed" by having seen it; rather, they were interested and inquisitive, and asked questions, which led to further wiki-exploring. What's the issue? Why should the rest of the world be forced to submit to your standards of "offensive"? Sasata (talk) 04:48, 17 November 2010 (UTC)

You don't get it. Just like an article on human reproduction does not need a pornographic picture, an article on a disease does not need a horror picture. It's not censorship, it's common courtesy. It's the same idea as not to tell colorful jokes at work place. Wilsonbond (talk) 04:27, 17 November 2010 (UTC)

Sure, the picture makes my heart hurt for the kid, but the image does it's job of showing the nastiness and horror of the disease.--intelati^talk 04:34, 17 November 2010 (UTC)

Smallpox was a horrible disease; trying to show it as something else isn't truthful. If people get offended by the truth, that's their problem. Allens (talk) 11:54, 18 October 2011 (UTC)

You don't educate people by offending them, that picture (not that poor girl) offends people. Wilsonbond (talk) 04:40, 17 November 2010 (UTC)

It is a great picture and the best one I have seen that illustrates the disease. Do you have a better one? Doc James (talk · contribs · email) 04:55, 17 November 2010 (UTC)

What you are pursuing is sensationalism, so don't pretend it's all for the truth. I'm sure there are plenty of less graphic picture of that disease. Just to show you what bad taste means:　Brandon Lee's death footage was destroyed without being developed, because watching it would be in bad taste. Thank god people like you did not get your dirty hands on that! Wilsonbond (talk) 05:02, 17 November 2010 (UTC)

This is simply what smallpoxs looks like. We are not going to censor it. Please WP:AGF. Doc James (talk · contribs · email) 05:22, 17 November 2010 (UTC)

Agreed that it is a good picture: smallpox was a horrible disease, which thankfully has been erradicated. We describe symptoms both with words and images, and for the latter I believe this is a great image. I am no physician, I did not knew how smallpox looked like and the image was produced a high impact on me, but also gave me more info in a single second that all the symptoms subsection.--Garrondo (talk) 07:17, 17 November 2010 (UTC)

On a side note: please do not make personal attacks or assume bad faith.(See: WP:civility)--Garrondo (talk) 11:44, 17 November 2010 (UTC)

This picture may be an efficient representation of the disease, however, it's pretty much on par with gore. For example, one could have a picture of a car accident with a severed head in the wikipedia page for decapitation. This would be the most likely modern cause of decapitation and it would accurately portray the article. You could also argue decapitation is a horribly socking thing, that needs an equally horribly shocking picture. Yes yes, I call strawman on myself, but to the point; Gore images affect the readability of the article for some users. It's not at all uncommon for children to have to research smallpox, so at the least there should be a way of hiding the image, like a link that says [hide image] above it. Rather than being artsy and trying to maximize representation I suggest we maximize the amount of information portrayed when deciding which picture to use. Technically a mound of rotting dead babies with smallpox is a better representation of the disease, but it's obviously in bad taste. As neutral writers we do not need to add more dramatic emphasis or find the most poetic representations, the content will speak for itself. Showing smallpox lesions are enough, having it be a child at an advanced stage only furthers the gore level while not contributing information. Furthermore, if a picture is used, it should be attached to the symptoms section. The physical manifestations are not the only definition of the disease. JimmyRuska (talk) —Preceding undated comment added 08:38, 22 November 2010 (UTC).

Feel free to propose or provide a superior image. There is a discussion about creating image settings for children and the faint of heart / easily offended. Not sure where they are currently in this process but this will make all potentially offense images easier to self censor. Wikimedia is in the process of hiring further staff so hopefully this will be possible soon. Doc James (talk · contribs · email) 09:15, 22 November 2010 (UTC)

Articles like rinderpest, HIV use a different approach, articles like chickenpox and measles use the physical manifestations, but in a more tasteful way. I do not know what is standard practice and I have no suggestions other than the assertion the current picture is probably inappropriate. I only passed by because there seemed to be debate and I felt strongly to chime in; as far as image rights and implementation, I am clueless. It's important to differentiate the level of gore though. Think back to what popular culture often uses for horror, you find: zombies, mutants, demons, dolls, aliens, and basically anything that looks like a diseased or horribly mutated, diseased or injured humanoid-looking creature, especially with detail in the face. The brain is used to automatically gauging attractiveness as a natural method of finding a healthy mate. The more carnage, the more deathly or sickly the picture is, the higher the emotional response will be, more so than any non human-looking entity could ever elicit in terms of reactive horror. On a scale of things that will most likely make people uncomfortable, I think a little girl, probably near death and covered with scarred sticky pustules ranks up there with a picture of a needle going into someone's eye, somewhere at the top of the scale of max-discomfort-inducing-efficiency. It's pretty strong, and not just another typical medical picture. JimmyRuska (talk) 09:56, 22 November 2010 (UTC)

The image can impose an emotional harm on the reader who may be passing by doing research on the subject. I agree with the person above, that the image of the little girl covered in diseases is very graphic. Some may argue it is needed to show whafft smallpox look like, and there is a lack of alternative. In that case, at the very least, there should be a warning on the image. Personally, I have had two nights of nightmare because I stumbled upon this article. Respectfully Yours. 68.6.110.128 (talk) 05:04, 11 December 2010 (UTC)

I am trypophobic and clusters of holes bother me physically (throat tightening, hands itching, skin crawling) as do clusters of bumps like the image (or what I could make of it; I closed it very quickly). Many people who have trypophobia may even start to hyperventilate if they see images that bother them. The image is a safety hazard for trypophobic people and others who are bothered by clusters of bumps/holes. I think the image should be removed for this reason. 72.219.176.11 (talk) 10:07, 2 March 2011 (UTC)

50-70% of physicians use Wikipedia weekly. No physician in practice less than 30 years has seen an active case of smallpox. If we do not see images as they are suppressed due to concerns of causing harm to trypophic people and a delay in a smallpox diagnosis occurs millions of excess people could die as a result. The risk that smallpox recurs is not that small. Both the USA and the former USSR have large about of smallpox in weapon form. Also we are an encyclopedia. This our goal is to provide the sum of all human knowledge. This is part of that knowledge.

So to conclude I am more worried about preventing real world nightmares. This can be done by not only educating people about how horrible small pox is but working with the USSR and the USA to decrease there stockpiles of this infectious disease and may be even eliminate it entirely. Doc James (talk · contribs · email) 17:04, 2 March 2011 (UTC)

That some percentage of physicians use Wikipedia seems irrelevant. It's not a resource for physicians; one expects specialists would have their own, specialized resources. The justification that this image would allow people to more rapidly identify smallpox doesn't seem applicable to the vast majority of users. Obonicus (talk) 02:47, 28 November 2012 (UTC)

This image does bother me, but I think it's not the rash, rather her black eyes. Could we change it to this image instead?

I would certainly vote to use a different picture. Seeing it makes me want to exit the page - not read on and learn more.Tklink (talk) 21:18, 11 May 2011 (UTC)

I like the current image. It illustrated the condition well. Doc James (talk · contribs · email) 21:33, 11 May 2011 (UTC)

Another vote for replacing this image with one less graphic. It may be that medical professionals need to consult an accurate representation of the disease; if this is the case I should hope that they consult an appropriate medical text, so that Wikipedia can remain usable for the rest of us. IronSheep (talk) 01:19, 1 July 2011 (UTC)

I've moved that image further down in the article. Evenfiel (talk) 13:38, 7 August 2011 (UTC)

No consensus for the move thus returned. Soon people will have a way to keep from seeing disturbing images on Wikipedia. Doc James (talk · contribs · email) 04:28, 9 August 2011 (UTC)

No consensus? As far as I'm concerned, there is no consensus for this photo to be in the lead. You're being egoistic for not taking into account several users complaints. Moving the photo further down is not hurting the article in any way, since the other lead picture is perfectly fine and your beloved photo will still be available to everyone. I'm proposing a solution to this conflict, while you're not proposing anything. Evenfiel (talk) 08:23, 9 August 2011 (UTC)

Wikipedia is not censored. The best image goes in the lead. The image in question is a "featured image" and is in color. You could try a request for comment. My proposal is that soon people who do not wish to see certain images can self censor themselves without forcing censorship on others.Doc James (talk · contribs · email) 19:01, 9 August 2011 (UTC)

The picture belongs in the lead. Smallpox was an horrendous disease and it is our duty to describe it as such. This image speaks volumes and alone goes a long way to explaining the enormous worldwide effort that went into eradication. I can't see how this image makes Wikipedia unusable. Does this mean that we should hide the truth? Seeing this image is an extremely important part of "learning about smallpox". I am probably right in thinking that no commentators here have seen a case of smallpox. I have. You have to see the symptoms of this disease to fully understand it. If casual readers are put off by the image, they are probably not that interested in learning about the disease. Wikipedia is not censored. If it were, I would not contribute to it. If our humble article has any tiny influence on making sure that suffering like this never happens again we should be very proud. Graham Colm (talk) 20:05, 9 August 2011 (UTC)

Agree completely with Graham. If this image is in peoples minds and if small pox ever gets out of the labs in which it exists having people remember this image has the potential to save millions of lives. If this pushes people to help the former USSR and USA protect / eliminate its stockpiles of the disease we at Wikipedia have done something great.Doc James (talk · contribs · email) 20:13, 9 August 2011 (UTC)

Could you explain to me how to move that picture further down in the article can be classified as "censoring" or "hiding" it? What I am trying to do is to give people time to decide whether they really want to keep on seeing pictures about smallpox or not, while saving the worst of the lot for the last. If they decide they do and continue reading the articles, or just seeing the pictures, at least they knew what was coming at them. What you are trying to do is to use shock & horror tactics in order to make people realize what a horrible disease it was. I see that both of you are doctors, so I guess you're quite used to seeing all kinds of deformities or bizarre aspects of human body. Unlike you, the vast majority of people have nothing to do with medicine and are uncomfortable with such pictures. As for Doc James's proposal that people will be able to self censor, this is a moot point, since the vast majority of Wikipedia users don't even have an account.

Anyway, if you wanna keep up with your shock & horror tactics, you still have a lot of work to do here in Wikipedia. You can start by going through the whole list of Sexually transmitted disease and change the lead photos for the most horrible pictures you can find. Pretty much all of these articles have a rather tame picture in their lead. Evenfiel (talk) 00:54, 10 August 2011 (UTC)

The point is not shock and awe but to accurately represent disease. It appears that we shall have to agree to disagree on this one.Doc James (talk · contribs · email) 02:30, 10 August 2011 (UTC)

Yes, the point is shock and awe. The other pictures shows the child with several pustules in his body, but in a less graphic way. You also chose to ignore my main point. I'm not removing the picture from the article, but just moving it further down. There is no consensus to maintain this picture. At least half of the users who posted here would like to see it replaced. I'm proposing a possible solution for this conflict. We don't need to remove it from the article, only from the lead. Evenfiel (talk) 10:53, 10 August 2011 (UTC)

Graham, which of the several images of smallpox is most typical of the disease? IMO, there is a tendency in medical publications to have illustrations that are towards the worst end of the scale for the same reason that books for identifying minerals or flowers or birds only show perfect specimens, rarely seen in the field, because they boldly illustrate the features. Although that approach has its merits, there is a danger that readers (physicians or lay) get the impression that it is commonly that bad. If that poor girl is typical of what occurred (in the third world, say) then I'm happy for it to the be the lead in this article. If the alternative offered by Evenfiel is actually more typical (even though it might not look much different to a bad case of chickenpox) then we should use that and move the worse-case image to later in the article.

The current image does highlight how much more potentially scarring and deadly smallpox is compared to chickenpox. So it is useful for the lead for that reason. But it is shocking and if untypical then I don't support it in the lead. The "Wikipedia is not censored" card is easy to play but we wouldn't, I hope, argue that this image would be a good choice to illustrate disease, infectious disease, infection, etc. Whereas we might be quite happy with a picture of someone sneezing to illustrate those. -- Colin°^Talk 12:16, 10 August 2011 (UTC)

The fact that it is in color I consider important.Doc James (talk · contribs · email) 15:26, 10 August 2011 (UTC)

The image is typical of variola major. I have seen more severe cases – unpublished images from the collection of the late Thomas Henry Flewett. The haemorrhagic form was even more extreme but less common. I don't know the full provenance of the monochrome picture of the girl, but to me it looks like a convalescing case. Smallpox only resembled chickenpox in the early stages of smallpox infection. This is what smallpox infection looked like. Let's hope we never see it again. Of course we could not justify its use to generically illustrate the more common and benign infectious diseases, but it belongs in this article and in the Lead. I concede that a colour picture of an adult showing these typical signs would be preferable, but I don't know of a free one we could use.Graham Colm (talk) 17:50, 10 August 2011 (UTC)

I dont find the image particularly disturbing and think it does authentically portray the effects of the disease on people. However - for a encyclopedic purposes an image showing the symptoms of the disease in a specific infected person is not the appropriate image to use in the infobox - rather a picture of the microscopic virus itself is whats called for here; it is much more general to the subject of the article. A quick scan at other wikipedia articles about infectious diseases (HIV, flu, cold etc) reveals this is the common precedent. So,I would propose we lower this picture where it is more relevant (in the discussion of symptoms) and replace it with the microscopic image of the virus. Solid State Survivor (talk) 21:13, 10 August 2011 (UTC)

We frequently use images of disease to illustrate said disease. Jaundice... Doc James (talk · contribs · email) 00:41, 11 August 2011 (UTC)

The effect of small pox is of more interest than the structure of the virus. Keep the sick child picture. Jim1138 (talk) 01:39, 11 August 2011 (UTC)

Thanks for the speedy response Doc. An image of the symptoms of a disease is not synonymous with a picture of the disease itself. With a disease like smallpox (one where there is a definite viral agent) a picture of the virus itself is most synonymous with the disease (for instance we would say a person infected with the virus who emited no symptoms carries the disease). The Jaundice article you reference uses its picture appropriately since Jaundice is itself a sort of symptom brought about from other health issues such as heptitis or liver failure.Solid State Survivor (talk) 01:57, 11 August 2011 (UTC)

Smallpox infection does not give rise to asymptomatic carriers. This is one of reasons why it could be eradicated. The image illustrates smallpox infection. Graham Colm (talk) 05:25, 11 August 2011 (UTC)

This article is about smallpox the disease, not variola virus. Our infectious disease articles are a bit inconsistent wrt whether the virus has its own article or not. Please nobody suggest rotavirus should have a picture of the symptoms in the lead :-) Colin°^Talk 08:00, 11 August 2011 (UTC)

The picture is scary as hell. It's not simply disturbing; it's actually haunting as it lingers in your head, and I'm a person who does not get scared easily. Wikipedia should not have "scary as hell" shock images, at least not in the lead. The reason behind this is because the image literally pops up when the page loads and can catch people by surprise. Wikipedia is an encyclopedia for research and education. Likewise, the image is very "artsy" in its composition (specifically the darkness of the eyes). The image seems to have been made to be deliberately disturbing and not simply a representation of the affects of the disease. — Preceding unsigned comment added by Anikom15 (talk • contribs) 05:51, 14 August 2011 (UTC)

I was rather taken aback by the striking photo. Like most people under the age of 40, I have never seen a real case of smallpox. Thank goodness I never will. In my opinion, the photo appropriately illustrates the nature of the disease. Axl ¤ [Talk] 23:19, 14 August 2011 (UTC)

We all hope we never see this disease but a number of countries still have large receives of it in culture vats ready to release upon the world at short notice either by accident or on purpose. Our best chance will be to identify it as soon as possible. Thus everyone needs to know what it looks like.Doc James (talk · contribs · email) 18:35, 18 October 2011 (UTC)

I am amazed that discussion about the use of this picture, despite its length, is exclusively centered on your reactions to it and never raises the question whether or not the actual person shown in it agrees to her picture being made public use of. Oh, I forgot: she's not white and she's poor, so she does not have any rights at all as far as Americans are concerned. 62.62.170.136 (talk) 07:07, 2 April 2012 (UTC)

I do not believe this is a reasonable objection. This is a file photo provided by the US Centers for Disease Control for illustrating the effects of smallpox. It is one of many such photos published in the public domain by the CDC library illustrating diseases from around the world. The place to register objection to this type use would be with the CDC and the US public health establishment, not Wikipedia. --MillingMachine (talk) 13:58, 17 May 2012 (UTC)

polio has now been eradicated. - Sireditprofusely (talk) 20:41, 2 April 2014 (UTC)

If only! Polio has been eradicated from India, but is still endemic in three coutries. Hopefully within our lifetimes... Adrian J. Hunter^{(talk•contribs)} 10:28, 3 April 2014 (UTC)

I suspect this has been raised before, but is there any reason File:Child with Smallpox Bangladesh.jpg is not used in the article? J Milburn (talk) 19:11, 12 August 2010 (UTC)

Agree. Doc James (talk · contribs · email) 18:47, 6 September 2010 (UTC)

That picture was removed because it's absolutely nightmarish. Lots of people complained about it here. Wikipedia is an encyclopedia written for everyone, not only medical professionals. Evenfiel (talk) 23:22, 14 October 2010 (UTC)

What is wrong with this image? The others do not properly display the dimple. If we do not have a proper image of small pox in the lead and this disease comes back and people do not recognize it we have done the world a disservice. Returned the image again. Smallpox is BTW a disturbing disease. Little over a hundred years ago it was the leading cause of death in North America. It is one of the successes of modern medicine via vaccination. Russian and the USA still hold stockpiles of the stuff to us as biological warfare.Doc James (talk · contribs · email) 20:50, 24 October 2010 (UTC)

This picture is currently a featured picture. Doc James (talk · contribs · email) 14:47, 9 November 2010 (UTC)

Reviewer: Garrondo (talk) 18:26, 16 November 2010 (UTC)

GA Review

This review is transcluded from Talk:Smallpox/GA1. The edit link for this section can be used to add comments to the review.

I have taken a quick read of the article and it is great. I believe it is clearly above GAN, and there should be no important issues. Nevertheless I suppose the intention is to take the article to FAC so I will try to do a more in depth, useful, review as I have time (I myself have a GAN at a similar point). I also have to say that I am not a physician but a psychologist working in neurology research, so a I will not be able to check for accuracy, but I will for readership.

Some general comments:

• The article is very, very long, and therefore horrible to load. While I understand that sometimes seems a good idea to have all content in a centralized article in this case it is probably worth summarizing and creating a subarticle of the history section. At this point even the history section by itself could pass a GAN!!!
• To follow MEDMOS sections a "society" section could be created with two subsections: warfare and famous patients. (I would eliminate the and culture from the name per having warfare as subsection.
• When finishing writing a disease article I find it useful to try to eliminate the name of the disease as many times as possible in the article: overuse is most of the times the case. I will probably be also a good idea to do it here: a first clear example from classification: There are two clinical forms of smallpox. Variola major is the severe and most common form of smallpox, with a more extensive rash and higher fever. Variola minor is a less common presentation of smallpox, and a much less severe disease, with historical death rates of 1% or less can be converted into There are two clinical forms of smallpox. Variola major is the severe and most common form, with a more extensive rash and higher fever. Variola minor is a less common presentation of, and a much less severe disease, with historical death rates of 1% or less

Lead: summarizes adequately the article and it is interesting. As minor comments:

• It should be the most accesible part of the article: it would be a good idea to explain the meaning of Maculopapular
• Specific date of death of the Ramses is probably not needed in lead: everybody knows that they are ancient...
• 2 times year in the same sentence is not very nice. In er year during the closing years
• In the last 2 paragraphs it is quite clear that it was a terrible disease. Maybe some of the numbers could be eliminated for the sake of simplicity... with half of them is probably enough to make the point. Similarly it is quite clear that numbers are stimations, so there is no need to say it each time.
• Month of erradications unneded in lead (been bold and eliminated myself).

Classification Does a nice job classifying the disease subtypes according to symptoms.

Signs and symptoms

• Orofaringeal and respiratory are not the same?
• the virus seems to move from cell to cell: do not know much about virology, but this hardly seems an accurate description.
• An explanation of toxemia?
• bleeding into the skin: Sounds strange although it may be me since my mother-tongue is not English.
• This form develops in perhaps 2%: perhaps sounds strange. In addition all paragraph is unreferenced.
• In the early, or fulminating form, hemorrhaging appears on the second or third day as sub-conjunctival bleeding turns the whites of the eyes deep red. : Not sure I understand this sentence: too technical, akward wording, not clear meaning...

More to come...--Garrondo (talk) 19:35, 16 November 2010 (UTC)

Comment Hi, hope you don't mind me dropping in uninvited. I've had this article on my watchlist and my "to-do" list to bring to GA/FAC, so I'm glad someone else has picked up the ball! I've dropped a number of cite needed tags to various places that need them. There's more citations needed in the "Famous sufferers" section, but the whole section needs to be written into paragraphs rather than isolated sentences. Let me know if you need help with finding sources Nergaal, I have access to a lot of literature on the subject. Good luck! Sasata (talk) 19:07, 16 November 2010 (UTC)

I fully agree with comment above.--Garrondo (talk) 19:35, 16 November 2010 (UTC)

Comment I rewrote and expanded this article way back in December 2007, with the intention of taking it to FAC. I've kept an eye on it over the years, but unfortunately real life got in the way and I never found the time to get it up to FA-caliber snuff. I am happy to see that it has now been nominated as a GA. A few notes:

• I spun out a LOT of the original history section to its own article already, but the History of smallpox article is a mess, perhaps if the history article were cleaned up some of the information in the main article could find a home there.
• Most of the disease information (i.e. signs, complications, treatment, diagnosis) came from the CDC pink book (ref 18 in current version) or the AFIP (ref 4). If you are looking for citations for specific numbers they probably came from one of those sources.
• The "sufferers" sections will likely require a lot of work. One suggestion might be to turn it into List of smallpox sufferers or something. For a similar approach see List of poliomyelitis survivors.

Please let me know if I can be of any assistance.--DO11.10 (talk) 22:52, 16 November 2010 (UTC)

• Woow. Lots of things to fix. I thought this would make a good GA when I read it. Shooting for FA would be a nice idea but I am not sure I have the time in the near future to deal with something like that. I will try to fix the issues listed here over the weekend. Nergaal (talk) 05:17, 18 November 2010 (UTC)

Since the nominator will have time difficulties ammending the proposed changes and does not have the intention of taking the article to FAC in the near future I'll leave my comments as proposals for future improvement and a do a review only of GAC. If in the future this comments are fixed and anybody thinks it could be useful I will probably be willing to continue with the started review.--Garrondo (talk) 14:40, 23 November 2010 (UTC)

• 1. Well-written: Yes: I (a non expert) followed it easily, and learnt a lot of a disease I did not know. As pointed above some technical terms should be explained in the future
• 2. Factually accurate and verifiable: Yes: sources are of medium to high quality and most content is sourced.
• 3. Broad in its coverage: Yes, although it may be too broad, as pointed above with the history section. I found the article to be quite demanding due to its very broad coverage
• 4. Neutral: Yes
• 5. Stable: Yes, although there seems to be some debate over image use.
• 6. Illustrated, if possible, by images: Yes.

Please please take down that picture, it gives me nightmares, and I'm 42. I wonder how many people this pictures has scarred for life. God! —Preceding unsigned comment added by 99.146.20.134 (talk) 03:45, 17 November 2010 (UTC)

Sorry, but Wikipedia is not censored. Reaper Eternal (talk) 03:47, 17 November 2010 (UTC)

does anyone know if shes ok? (p.s.: i would move the pic down.)Jake1993811 (talk) 09:55, 30 December 2011 (UTC)

• Comment/question Have people gone mad? Who is there here who thought smallpox was a cutesy little childhood malady that we can now ignore, together with syphilis and seasickness? If you want to sit back and tsk tsk smugly about a disease that in its final 3/4 century or so, long after a cheap and effective vaccine had become available, took more human lives than all the wars of that century combined, and ruined more lives than it took, then go and read something else; this one is not for you. And if the picture is what it takes to convince you of that, then you needed it. If sanitised tragedy is your preferred genre, read about the history of Manchester United F.C. or about the career of Errol Flynn. For you the highly unsanitary likes of smallpox, plague, yellow fever or the like are unsuited, and you will never wish to understand what they once meant to people and to nations. HIV is a picnic in comparison; so is Ebola and it will remain so until it mutates into seriously human-contagious form. All that is fine, as long as you don't have to look at a nightmarish picture? Did you not want to know the dread of such a sickness or why it was dreaded? The article is about the facts and one fact is that no matter how great the eventual triumph of scientific medicine, the disease was hideous, which is what the picture shows. Obscenity? The real obscenity is the idea of consigning that picture, and by implication the sufferings of that child, to the waste-basket of history. Her picture is a lesson, an item of education too dearly bought to pay for in advance, and too valuable to discard in retrospect. If you want to ignore it, read something else, watch something else, but don't try to hobble the education of serious students by indulging your own grizzlings. JonRichfield (talk) 12:41, 3 April 2014 (UTC)

Are all authors who upload such pictures driven by psychic labil narzism? There is also a way to present an infection with Smallpox over a not such disturbing way, especially not showing children with it. — Preceding unsigned comment added by 46.115.54.171 (talk) 17:24, 30 January 2014 (UTC)

What do you mean by 'psychic labil narzism'?

The disease is extinct in the wild and the image would be disturbing whoever was shown.

Is there anybody still alive who had 'wild/non-laboratory originated' smallpox? 80.254.147.68 (talk) 18:01, 30 January 2014 (UTC)

Seeing the picture is absolutely nothing compared to the disease. IMO it is best not to make the article sterile; it should have some impact.

The last known case was in 1977. No reason people can not live to a ripe old age if they survive in reasonable shape. Jim1138 (talk) 19:11, 30 January 2014 (UTC)

Damned right about seeing the picture! Anyone who doesn't want to know about what the disease meant, needn't read about what it meant, and decidedly need not insist on other people being spared the sight of it, or being spared the facts. I commented along similar lines elsewhere on this page. Yo no lik'? Yo no look! JonRichfield (talk) 12:48, 3 April 2014 (UTC)

A researcher is quoted in a BBC article about a 30,000 year-old amoeba-attacking virus becoming re-activated out of permafrost. He/she says that there is a risk of an old smallpox virus being frozen somewhere. If this view is not a fringe one, I imagine we could source it somewhere in the article. Biosthmors (talk) pls notify me (i.e. {{U}}) while signing a reply, thx 19:40, 4 March 2014 (UTC)

Hmmm... A reasonable question concerning an important point, but the article cited is a bit simplistic, no matter whom it quotes. There are many poxviruses in nature, and it is likely that in the past smallpox started out as a zoonosis that adapted to humans, effectively generating a new species. If so, the likelihood of any frozen and newly-thawed virus amounting to a human-virulent strain is very low. Now, I am not about to debate the facts of such prospects, but I do suggest at the very least that before we add anything so hand-waving to a WP article, we find someone who can contribute something both non-trivial and properly cited. JonRichfield (talk) 12:58, 3 April 2014 (UTC)

I am not comfortable with omitting the name of the researcher in question. Is it not supposed to be notable? Is it even considerate to consign him to oblivion? Has anyone objected to his name being mentioned? I'm not about to start an edit war, but it seems to me that to omit factual material out of squeamishness is a betrayal. Ask Herostratus. JonRichfield (talk) 19:08, 18 March 2014 (UTC)

I agree. The name should go back. Incidently, Bedson's father was famous for discovering Chlamydia, (once called "Bedsonia"). Henry Bedson, whose name was removed from the article, was the subject of a newspaper story as recently as 2011 . As for "RIP", we can't anonymise dead people on Wikipedia -that would be daft. Graham Colm (talk) 19:29, 18 March 2014 (UTC)

I agree as well. Mind you, I think it's possible he may very well have prefered to be forgotten in this respect, given that he was apparently a dedicated researcher and it was the fallout from the infection of Ms. Parker (notable as the last known person to be infected with the disease and the last to die from it), which drove him to suicide, but it remains pertinent (in ancillary) information, all the same. Snow (talk) 22:18, 30 March 2014 (UTC)

Thanks folks. As no one has actually done any editing, I did it and added a ref to the actual report mandated by the British house of commons. JonRichfield (talk) 14:15, 3 April 2014 (UTC)

The link http://www.who.int/mediacentre/factsheets/smallpox/en/ was retrieved in 2007 and is now (as of April 2014) dead. The article relies on this link for five citations. The nearest links on the who web site are:

• http://www.who.int/topics/smallpox/en/ and
• http://www.who.int/csr/disease/smallpox/faq/en/

Neither of these links directly contain the information referred to in the article.

The information from the article can be found in various documents on the WHO site, but some of these could be considered primary sources so I don't know quite how to handle them in the context of this article:

• http://whqlibdoc.who.int/smallpox/WHO_SE_78.106.pdf "The Certification of Smallpox Eradication in Countries Without Recent Reported Endemic Transmission" aka WHO/SE/78.106 says that the last case of smallpox was the Variola minor strain(variant? I haven't verified the wording here), on 26 October 1977 as claimed in the article. Aside: The wording in the article could be understood to equate Variola minor with smallpox, whereas I understand major and minor are two variant of the smallpox virus. The source here says the final case of Variola major was two years earlier.
• http://www.who.int/about/bugs_drugs_smoke_chapter_1_smallpox.pdf "Smallpox, Eradicating an Ancient Scourge" partially supports the article content for its 1967 figures but instead of saying 15 million cases in 1967 it says "In 1967, there were around 10-15 million cases of smallpox in the world each year, a figure which had dropped from around 50 million cases a year in the 1950s.". I haven't found a good source for the claim that "two million died in that year" as yet.
• http://www.who.int/immunization/sage/nov2010_global_technical_consult_measles_eradication_durrheim.pdf and http://www.who.int/csr/resources/publications/PED_SmallpoxACVVR_report2013.pdf both make passing mention of the eradication of rinderpest, supporting the article... but I didn't find a great source on who.int for that claim.
• http://www.who.int/csr/disease/smallpox/en/ "Global Alert and Response (GAR), Smallpox" supports the article's claim that Smallpox was officially declared eradicated in 1979. The FAQ http://www.who.int/csr/disease/smallpox/faq/en/ says this occurred in December 1979.
• The article claims that "routine childhood vaccination was discontinued in the United States in 1972, and was abandoned in most European countries in the early 1970s". http://www.who.int/bulletin/volumes/84/2/editorial10206html/en/ "Bulliten of the World Health Organisation, Control, elimination, eradication and re-emergence of infections diseases: getting the message right" says that in 1980 routine smallpox vaccination was discontinued in all countries. http://apps.who.int/vaccine_safety/topics/smallpox/smallpox_aefi_cdc.pdf (a slideshow presentation) agrees that in 1972 US Routine childhood vaccination stopped, with routine health care worker vaccination stopping in 1976 and a halt to US vaccine production in 1982. http://whqlibdoc.who.int/smallpox/WHO_SE_73.58.pdf is something of an original source from 1973 I think that argues against the 1971 US Public Health Service Recommendation on Smallpox Vaccination, but I don't think clearly states a date when routine vaccination was discontinued.
• http://whqlibdoc.who.int/publications/a41438.pdf "The Global Eradication of Smallpox, Final Report of the Global Commission for the Certification of Smallpox Eradication, Geneva, December 1979" in its Foreward supports the article's claim that the eradication was certified on 8 May 1980.

Fixed thanks to the miracle of the Wayback Machine. You're welcome to substitute in more recent sources and tweak the wording as required. Thanks, Adrian J. Hunter^{(talk•contribs)} 17:00, 8 April 2014 (UTC)

Hopefully I have put enough links and information here that someone a touch more competent could use them to replace the dead link and amend any text needing to change. Any takers? FuzzyBSc (talk) 15:56, 8 April 2014 (UTC)

This article has been revised as part of a large-scale clean-up project of multiple article copyright infringement. (See the investigation subpage) Earlier text must not be restored, unless it can be verified to be free of infringement. For legal reasons, Wikipedia cannot accept copyrighted text or images borrowed from other web sites or printed material; such additions must be deleted. Contributors may use sources as a source of information, but not as a source of sentences or phrases. Accordingly, the material may be rewritten, but only if it does not infringe on the copyright of the original or plagiarize from that source. Please see our guideline on non-free text for how to properly implement limited quotations of copyrighted text. Wikipedia takes copyright violations very seriously. Diannaa (talk) 22:53, 29 March 2014 (UTC)

Does anyone know what material in specific this was in regards to? Less than useful notice without context.... Snow talk 02:32, 9 May 2014 (UTC)

Is there anyone still alive who had 'wild' (as distinct from 'laboratory accident and similar') smallpox? 80.254.147.68 (talk) 16:32, 15 April 2014 (UTC) (Corrections due to usual computer snarly-ups) 80.254.147.68 (talk) 16:34, 15 April 2014 (UTC)

Presumably yes, particularly in Africa, Asia, and east Europe. But it is not clear how you could locate anyone. Wilcannia (talk) 02:52, 18 April 2014 (UTC)

Original resaerch for 'the proverbial someone' (when they have caught up with everything else). 80.254.147.68 (talk) 15:50, 13 May 2014 (UTC)

Uploaded this image to commons, if you wish to use it go ahead and add it to the article. CFCF (talk · contribs · email) 12:59, 6 June 2014 (UTC)

In lead picture "In ordinary type smallpox the bumps are filled with a thick, opaque fluid and often have a depression or dimple in the center."

It should say whether the type is major or minor.

Also the other picture

"Child showing rash due to ordinary-type smallpox (variola major)"

Does this mean that 'ordinary-type' = 'variola major' or that these are distinct classifications. This is somewhat confusing in the article

Macgroover (talk) 02:33, 17 July 2014 (UTC)

 Done

Regarding the sentence: "Fatality rates during outbreaks in Native American populations ere as high as 80–90%." This should be "Case fatality rates." As it stands, it sounds like 80-90% of the populations died. — Preceding unsigned comment added by 205.232.191.21 (talk) 16:06, 27 August 2014 (UTC)

That is exactly what it means, and adding the word makes no difference. Yet, I have made the edit because the source does use it. -- Brangifer (talk) 17:27, 27 August 2014 (UTC)

I read somewhere that one fear is that a 'sealed coffin' (whether or not against bodysnatchers) cracking and letting the virus 'escape.'

How feasible is this? 80.254.147.68 (talk) 13:38, 21 November 2013 (UTC)

Very low. More likely is that some of the stuff in vats in the former soviet union of the USA gets out. Doc James (talk · contribs · email) (if I write on your page reply on mine) 14:29, 21 November 2013 (UTC)

There are various stories about 'viruses' and 'corn etc seeds' found in sealed tombs being grown on in modern times (along with Grauniad Island). Are there any 'diseases' which could survive and be revived from such conditions (even discounting the SF/horror fiction staple) - assuming due precautions are taken with plague pits etc (regardless of known survival time of the disease causing organism). 80.254.147.68 (talk) 15:51, 21 November 2013 (UTC)

The fear that 'whatever killed them buried here might also kill me (so keep away)' is both rational and irrational. 80.254.147.68 (talk) 13:03, 5 December 2013 (UTC)

The question is whether smallpox virions could persist for decades or centuries inside a coffin containing a corpse, and retain their virulence. I'm not qualified to answer that, but it's worth framing the issue correctly. — Preceding unsigned comment added by 66.233.207.101 (talk) 00:55, 22 September 2014 (UTC)