Number of reported smallpox cases, 1977
The reported number of smallpox cases each year. The historical number of smallpox cases reported is lower than the actual number of cases in those years,due to limited testing and reporting.
Reported Smallpox cases (WHO)
Data until 1966 was compiled from relevant tables in Fenner et al. (1988)'s Chapter 8 (link above): Fenner, F., Henderson, D. A., Arita, I., Jezek, Z., Ladnyi, I. D., & World Health Organization. (1988). Smallpox and its eradication.
1967 data retrieved from World Health Organization. (1969). Weekly Epidemiological Record, 1969, vol. 44, 4 [full issue]. Weekly Epidemiological Record = Relevé épidémiologique hebdomadaire, 44 (4), 69-88. http://apps.who.int/iris/bitstream/handle/10665/217012/WER4404.PDF?sequence=1&isAllowed=y 1968 and 1969 data retrieved from World Health Organization. (1970). Weekly Epidemiological Record, 1970, vol. 45, 3 [full issue]. Weekly Epidemiological Record = Relevé épidémiologique hebdomadaire, 45 (3), 17-36. http://apps.who.int/iris/bitstream/handle/10665/217559/WER4503.PDF?sequence=1&isAllowed=y 1970 data retrieved from World Health Organization. (1971). Weekly Epidemiological Record, 1971, vol. 46, 51 [full issue]. Weekly Epidemiological Record = Relevé épidémiologique hebdomadaire, 46 (51), 521-532. http://apps.who.int/iris/bitstream/handle/10665/218642/WER4651.PDF?sequence=1&isAllowed=y 1971 data retrieved from World Health Organization. (1972). Weekly Epidemiological Record, 1972, vol. 47, 26 [full issue]. Weekly Epidemiological Record = Relevé épidémiologique hebdomadaire, 47 (26), 249-256. http://apps.who.int/iris/bitstream/handle/10665/218953/WER4726.PDF?sequence=1&isAllowed=y 1972 data retrieved from World Health Organization. (1974). Weekly Epidemiological Record, 1974, vol. 49, 2 [full issue]. Weekly Epidemiological Record = Relevé épidémiologique hebdomadaire, 49 (2), 9-24. http://apps.who.int/iris/bitstream/handle/10665/219695/WER4902.PDF?sequence=1&isAllowed=y 1973 and 1974 data retrieved from World Health Organization. (1975). Table 5 Smallpox Surveillance. http://apps.who.int/iris/bitstream/handle/10665/220183/WER5003_21-22.PDF?sequence=1&isAllowed=y 1975 data retrieved from World Health Organization. (1976). Smallpox surveillance End of Year 1975 summary. http://apps.who.int/iris/bitstream/handle/10665/220670/WER5103_9-18.PDF?sequence=1&isAllowed=y 1976 data retrieved from World Health Organization. (1977). Weekly Epidemiological Record, 1977, vol. 52, 2 [full issue]. Weekly Epidemiological Record = Relevé épidémiologique hebdomadaire, 52 (2), 9-20. http://apps.who.int/iris/bitstream/handle/10665/221189/WER5202.PDF?sequence=1&isAllowed=y 1977 data retrieved from World Health Organization. (1978). Weekly Epidemiological Record, 1978, vol. 53, 2 [full issue]. Weekly Epidemiological Record = Relevé épidémiologique hebdomadaire, 52 (2), 9-20. http://apps.who.int/iris/bitstream/handle/10665/221687/WER5302.PDF?sequence=1&isAllowed=y
Some data cleaning was performed: East Pakistan was changed into Bangladesh and West Pakistan was changed into Pakistan. Upper Volta was changed into Burkina Faso, Southern Rhodesia to Zimbabwe, Ceylon to Sri Lanka but Dahomey (a region in today's Nigeria) was left as it is. For all countries that approached zero cases and then were not included in the Weekly Epidemiological Record (WER) anymore subsequently were assumed to have zero cases. This was done for 1967-1977.
The data of this indicator is based on the following sources:
World Health Organization (1969-1988)
Fenner et al. (1988) and various Weekly Epidemiological Records
How we process data at Our World in Data:
All data and visualizations on Our World in Data rely on data sourced from one or several original data providers. Preparing this original data involves several processing steps. Depending on the data, this can include standardizing country names and world region definitions, converting units, calculating derived indicators such as per capita measures, as well as adding or adapting metadata such as the name or the description given to an indicator.
At the link below you can find a detailed description of the structure of our data pipeline, including links to all the code used to prepare data across Our World in Data.
How to cite this data:
In-line citationIf you have limited space (e.g. in data visualizations), you can use this abbreviated in-line citation:
World Health Organization (1969-1988) – processed by Our World in DataFull citation
World Health Organization (1969-1988) – processed by Our World in Data. “Reported Smallpox cases (WHO)” [dataset]. World Health Organization (1969-1988) [original data].
Interactive visualization requires JavaScript
Related research and data
Charts
- Death rate from conflict and terrorismIHME, crude
- Death rate from conflict and terrorismIHME, age-standardized
- Deaths from conflict and terrorismIHME, GBD
- Discrepancy between reported and revised numbers of global smallpox cases
- Number of reported smallpox cases by world region
- Smallpox cases reported worldwide
- Smallpox death rateUntil 1900
- Smallpox death rate versus life expectancy in Sweden
- Smallpox deaths as a share of all deaths in London1629 to 1902
- Smallpox: when was it eliminated in each country?