What Was Smallpox?

When I was a child, I noticed a strange scar on my mother’s upper arm—a circle of small indents around a larger one. It fascinated me for a while, then faded into the background of childhood memories. Years later, while helping an elderly woman off a train, I spotted the exact same scar in the same place. Curious, I called my mother. She reminded me of something I’d already been told: it was from the smallpox vaccine.

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