In 1960, Moscow narrowly escaped a major smallpox epidemic. The virus was brought to the city by Aleksey Kokorekin, a renowned Soviet poster artist. He spent two weeks visiting India, a country known for an unstable epidemic situation. Kokorekin went to see a funeral ceremony in Varanasi, «the city of the dead» and, greatly impressed by the scene, took the carpet belonging to the deceased Brahmin as a souvenir and brought it home. When he felt sick a few days after arriving home, neither he nor the doctors had smallpox in mind. A hospital receptionist was just laughed at for suggesting it. Kokorekin got worse and died a few days later, still undiagnosed. But when patients at the hospital started having the same symptoms, doctors revisited the smallpox idea and were horrified to find out they were right. How did they manage to prevent a national tragedy and defeat the virus?
Smallpox Outbreak in Moscow
