Published on
31/07/2026 - 16:08 GMT+2
Ancient mummy DNA recovered in Chile offers the clearest genetic evidence yet that European colonisation brought this disease to the Americas, according to a new study.
Smallpox was one of the deadliest diseases in human history before it was eradicated in 1980, largely thanks to vaccination. For centuries, the virus had killed about one-third of the people it infected and left most survivors with deep and sometimes disfiguring scars.
The first historically documented smallpox outbreak in the Americas occurred in 1518, during the Spanish conquest of the Caribbean. The disease then spread rapidly across North, Central and South America, killing millions of people, particularly among Indigenous populations who had no prior immunity.
