CONFIRMED90% CONFIDENCEThe Thirty-third World Health Assembly declared the global eradication of smallpox on 8 May 1980, the date of the resolution.[1]
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- May 8, 198090% CONFIDENCEfrom the source
Smallpox Is Declared Eradicated
The World Health Assembly certified that smallpox had been wiped from the earth - the only human disease ever eradicated. The last natural case had been in Somalia in 1977, and the campaign that found it had traced and vaccinated outwards from every case for a decade.
- The Assembly's declaration was made in Geneva on 8 May 1980, three years after the last naturally occurring case. [S]
- Smallpox killed around 300 million people in the twentieth century alone before the campaign closed on it. [S]
- Ring vaccination - immunising the contacts of each case rather than whole populations - is the method that finished it, and the model every outbreak response has used since.
References 290% CONFIDENCE
The first entry is always the pin's source. Overall confidence is a weighted average of how firmly each reference supports the start and end times used above; a reference counts half as much for every 180 days older than the newest.
- [1]90%en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Smallpoxen.wikipedia.org· Posted Sep 21, 2026· Starts May 8, 1980 ✓· 50% of score
The Thirty-third World Health Assembly declared the global eradication of smallpox on 8 May 1980, the date of the resolution.
- [2]90%WHO: History of smallpox vaccinationwho.int· Added Sep 21, 2026· 50% of score
The WHO's own history of the campaign it ran and certified.
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