A cell containing smallpox viruses, as captured by transmission electron microscopy

UP­DATE: Re­ports of small­pox-la­beled vials at Mer­ck plant con­tained 'no trace' of virus

Small­pox was de­clared erad­i­cat­ed  in 1980 by the World Health Or­ga­ni­za­tion, af­ter an ef­fort to vac­ci­nate the globe. But sev­er­al vials la­beled as the dis­ease were found at a Penn­syl­va­nia vac­cine re­search fa­cil­i­ty be­long­ing to Mer­ck, when a lab­o­ra­to­ry work­er was clean­ing out a freez­er.

The CDC re­leased a state­ment Thurs­day stat­ing that the vials con­tained no trace of the virus, but rather, the virus used in the small­pox vac­cine, and not var­i­o­la, the virus that caus­es small­pox.

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