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Vaccinia Reporter Viruses for Quantifying Viral Function at All Stages of Gene Expression
Published on: May 15, 2014
Factors affecting the likelihood of monkeypox's emergence and spread in the post-smallpox era
Mary G Reynolds1, Darin S Carroll, Kevin L Karem
1US Centers for Disease Control and Prevention, Poxvirus and Rabies Branch, 1600 Clifton Rd. NE, Atlanta, GA 30333, USA. Nzr6@cdc.gov
Abstract:
In 1980, the World Health Assembly announced that smallpox had been successfully eradicated as a disease of humans. The disease clinically and immunologically most similar to smallpox is monkeypox, a zoonosis endemic to moist forested regions in West and Central Africa. Smallpox vaccine provided protection against both infections. Monkeypox virus is a less efficient human pathogen than the agent of smallpox, but absent smallpox and the population-wide immunity engendered during eradication efforts, could monkeypox now gain a foothold in human communities? We discuss possible ecologic and epidemiologic limitations that could impede monkeypox's emergence as a significant pathogen of humans, and evaluate whether genetic constrains are sufficient to diminish monkeypox virus' capacity for enhanced specificity as a parasite of humans.
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