A global achievement: Rinderpest cattle plague wiped out

[Shiloh]

Source: http://www.thestar.com/news/sciencetech/article/997679--cattle-plague-rinderpest-wiped-out

Cattle plague rinderpest wiped out
Published On Wed May 25 2011
Reuters

PARIS ? A global effort has eradicated the cattle disease rinderpest, which caused the starvation of millions of people, making it the second disease after smallpox to be wiped out by humankind, world animal health body OIE said.

Rinderpest, known before the Roman era and also called cattle plague, did not affect humans directly but caused major famines by killing hundreds of millions of cattle in Europe, Africa and Asia.

After the disease reached Africa in the 19th century, one rinderpest pandemic is estimated to have been responsible for the starvation of one-third of the human population of Ethiopia...

 

[Shiloh]

Re: A global achievement: Rinderpest cattle plague wiped out

Source: http://www.washingtonpost.com/natio...-be-eradicated/2011/05/26/AGMPENCH_story.html

Rinderpest, or ?cattle plague,? becomes only second disease to be eradicated
By David Brown, Published: May 26

Rinderpest, a cattle disease that for centuries felled herds in Europe, Africa and Asia and caused periodic human famine, has been eradicated, veterinary epidemiologists announced this week.

Eradication is the Holy Grail of disease prevention and has been successful only once before. Smallpox, an equally devastating human scourge, was eradicated in 1980, proving it is possible to stamp out a microbe across the entire planet. Attempts are underway to rid the world of polio and Guinea worm disease...