I have my original hard copy immunization record going back to 1950. There are frequent entries due to my father’s job-related overseas travel, including seven for smallpox- in 1950, 1951, 1954, 1958, 1961, 1964 and 1968. I do not know why there were immunizations in consecutive years 1950-51; maybe the first one didn’t take. There has never been any prominent scarring, and there is no scarring now visible now.
Searching PubMed, I think this is the one. (Edit: And I wonder what on earth inspired someone to register for the board 4 years ago but never post, then re-emerge today and bump several old threads about vaccination.)
Really? I thought smallpox vaccination was discontinued worldwide prior to that. Are you sure it isn’t a BCG vaccine mark?
BTW, smallpox has NOT made a resurgence. Some people were vaxed after 9/11 because of the concern about bioterrorism, but honestly, it’s one of the worst agents to be used for that. By the time a person is contagious, they’re going to be covered in pock marks, and they’re also going to be so sick, they won’t want to leave the house anyway. IDK if it’s transmissible by contact other than person-to-person.
Actually, that’s why it was done that way, because many people were/are illiterate or don’t or can’t keep track of their immunization records. It was the first vaccine required for school attendance, and in this case, a “take” would be readily visible.
Because this was how the body created the immune response. Injecting it into a muscle, or sub-q for the MMR, or orally like the typhoid vaccine, doesn’t work.
I think the link indicates a “looks like it at lasts for at least decades” with regard to “Does smallpox vaccination ever wear off?”, but a “not sure (because we can’t actually test this)” with regard to “Does that do me any good against the resurgence of the disease in recent years?” [not that there’s been a resurgence, but let’s say bioterrorism release.]
From the link:
The paper, “Cutting edge: long-term B cell memory in humans after smallpox vaccination.”, can be found here.
I was born in 1967 and I was immunized. When I deployed to Iraq in 2008 I was immunized again. I got the big scab but when it went away I was left with a scar that was pretty much too small to see. Just like when I was a baby. There was no information I could find about complications from getting it twice after that many years.