U.S. To Stockpile Smallpox Vaccine.(Brief Article)

2001 DEC 19 - (NewsRx.com & NewsRx.net) -- The Bush administration says it will have enough smallpox vaccine on hand within a year to inoculate every American, but officials have no plans to use it absent a return of the virtually extinct but deadly virus.

The U.S. Department of Health and Human Services signed a contract November 28, 2001, to buy 155 million doses of vaccine from a British company, preparing for the possibility terrorists would try to spread the highly contagious disease. The contract with Acambis, Inc., is supposed to bring the nation's stockpile to 286 million doses of the vaccine by the end of next year, promising protection for every American.

But there are no plans to resume the routine vaccinations of Americans that ended in 1972, HHS Secretary Tommy Thompson said. That's because the vaccine can be administered four days after exposure to smallpox and still offer protection and because it can cause some rare but deadly side effects. Still, Thompson predicted that the contract would prompt demand for the shots by many Americans.

"That discussion is not only going to be taking place here in the department, but in Congress, at the White House and across America,'' he said.

Smallpox hasn't occurred in the United States since 1949 and was declared eradicated worldwide in 1980. But the U.S. Centers for Disease Control and Prevention in Atlanta, Georgia, and a Moscow, Russia, laboratory hold stocks of the virus, and bioterrorism experts worry that samples could fall into terrorists' hands and be used as a weapon. Experts believe such a smallpox attack is unlikely, but it could overwhelm communities were it to occur. The virus is highly contagious, and nearly a third of its victims die.

"The risk does exist and we must be prepared,'' Thompson said.

"Obtaining the vaccine represents an important insurance policy,'' added Dr. D.A. Henderson, who led the global campaign that eliminated smallpox and is now Thompson's top bioterrorism adviser. "It's simply a prudent thing to do at this point in time.''