Among biological weapons, smallpox is by far the bad guy of them all. “When Hernando Cortez arrived in America infecting Aztec Indian communities in 1520 AD, 35 million Aztecs died over the next two years. In the United States in 1763, Colonel Henry Bouchet gave smallpox-infected blankets to Native Americans during Pontiac's Rebellion, killing thousands; Sir Jeffrey Amherst, commander of the British forces in North America, used the same technique in New England with the same results” [Bromley, Sutton 4, (p. 72,78), 6]. Smallpox was a monstrous weapon that Europeans used against the native Indian population of North and South America. Radical organizations considered today's threat, such as Bin Laden and the Aum Shinrikyo sect in Japan, may one day acquire smallpox to use as a bioterrorist weapon (Preston, 131). Can America ever be ready for a smallpox epidemic: proper education would be difficult, an antiviral can only arrive by chance, and a government response would be haphazard at best; in case a smallpox epidemic occurs, hopefully we have an antiviral solution. Deadly viruses surround the human population always waiting for the right condition to destroy the human race. The average human being may only know three or four of these major viruses. Scientists have determined which viruses could spark a massive epidemic. After the incidents of September 11, scientists around the world are mainly focusing on smallpox. In 1979, a team of doctors and health officials from the World Health Organization (WHO) eliminated and collected all known smallpox samples from the globe. Officially, the smallpox virus exists in only two repositories: in the freezers of a building called Corpus 6 in Vector in Siberia, ... middle of paper ... on smallpox attack, perception of vaccine risk will influence decisions health workers' concerns about the vaccine. Works Cited • Richard Preston. "The Demon in the Freezer", Random House publishing group. 2002. Print• Terry L. Schraeder, MD, and Edward W. Campion, MD "Spox Vaccination - The Call to Arms," ​​n engl j med348;5 www.nejm.org January 30, 2003. Web• Daniel J. Kuhles and David M. Ackman. “Spox Vaccination Program: Where Do We Go From Here?” http://content.healthaffairs.org/content/early/2003/10/22/hlthaff.w3.503.citation. Web• W Katherine Yih*1, Tracy A Lieu1,2,3, Virginia H Rêgo1, Megan A O'Brien1, David K ​​Shay4, Deborah S Yokoe5,6 and Richard Platt1,5,6,7 "Operator Attitudes health workers in U.S. hospitals regarding smallpox vaccination." Public Health 2003. http://www.biomedcentral.com/1471-2458/3/20/prepubWeb