Kids Contract Smallpox From Discarded Vaccine

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Russian germ warfare antidote gives kids smallpox

4:17 a.m. ET (817 GMT) June 19, 2000

VLADIVOSTOK, Russia, June 19 (Reuters) — At least eight children in Russia's

Far East have contracted a mild form of smallpox from discarded vaccine

ampoules which a local clinic kept in case of germ warfare attack, officials

said on Monday.

Few people living today — even doctors — have had any experience of

smallpox, which has been officially eradicated worldwide. The last case of

the disease was registered in 1977 in Africa and countries stopped

vaccinating against it in 1980.

Dmitry Maslov, chief local medical inspector, told Reuters the children's

infections did not put their lives in danger and could not spread to others.

NTV commercial television said the young boys and girls's faces were likely

to be scarred for life.

Maslov said doctors in the regional capital Vladivostok had trouble

diagnosing eight children aged six to 12 who had been taken to hospital with

fever and severe rashes.

Their condition was pinned down to smallpox when doctors discovered that the

children had played with glass ampoules they found in the dustbin of the

local epidemiological centre.

The centre kept dozens of boxes of smallpox vaccine to combat a possible

enemy germ attack, as required by civil defence rules. When the vaccine

expired the medics threw the ampoules away instead of destroying them, he

said.

NTV said discarded boxes were strewn over a large area.

A prosecutor told Reuters officials expected to charge managers of the

epidemiological centre with criminal negligence.

Over the last years there have been a number of reported cases of Russians

contracting various diseases, including AIDS, due to alleged health care

workers' negligence.