Will climate change bring back SMALLPOX? Siberian corpses could ooze contagious virus if graveyards thaw out, claim scientists
Author Richard Stone wrote an article for Science asking whether smallpox is lurking in the Arctic. He described a 'nightmarish place near the Kolyma River' (pictured) in north eastern Siberia where defrosting bodies infected with smallpox oozed
He wrote: ‘The researchers huddle around a mummified child half-submerged in thawing mud. They gently peel away a few layers of deerskin clothing to reveal blackened skin pocked with blemishes characteristic of smallpox pustules.
‘As they cut into a wizened leg, liquid oozes from the spongy flesh.’ Smallpox is resilient when frozen and permafrost has previously yielded other types of living bacteria that are three million years old. If such a scenario did occur, it could potentially start a global pandemic.
The question has been the source of speculation for over a decade as scientists believe the disease could be in suspended animation in bodies that are surfacing as a result of the warming climate, Gizmodo reported
Smallpox making comebacks that some pop girls can only dream of
(but in seriousness i have played the game plague and virus' unleashed spread fast - i cant)