Despite all the Hoopla about a smallpox bioterror incident, this news from Imperial College, London today describes how a series of simple public health policies would be able to effectively contain the spread of smallpox if it were released into a population. Ccomputer models were used to test three main public health policies used to control epidemics, and found different but high levels of effectiveness in all.
The first policy the team looked at was rash-motivated case isolation, in which infected individuals with a rash sought medical care, were identified as smallpox cases and subsequently isolated.
The second policy the researchers looked at was combining contact tracing with vaccination to create a policy of 'ring' vaccination.
The third policy combined regional mass vaccination with isolation and contact tracing with vaccination.
All these modes were used during the successful fight against smallpox 20 years ago.
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